Test Flight Album Notes

Track List:

Test Flight - Kelly Rossum

A Space-Time Magnifying Glass - Niloufar Nourbakhsh

Improvised Landing -Kelly Rossum

Space Dust One - Kelly Rossum

Scream - Christopher Stark

Struck By Stars - Nadje Noordhuis

Space Dust Two - Kelly Rossum

Black Rock - David Sampson

Space Dust Three - Kelly Rossum

sitting on the dock looking at stars - Kelly Rossum

A Space-Time Magnifying Glass

Niloufar Nourbakhsh (b. 1992)

Composed 2022

Notes from the composer:

A Space–Time Magnifying Glass was commissioned by Fifth Bridge Ensemble for five trumpets and electronics. The piece was conceived in response to the profound images released by the James Webb Space Telescope in 2022—images that reframed our sense of scale, distance, and cosmic time.
The electronics trace an imagined journey through space: drifting, accelerating, and bending perspective as sound becomes a vehicle for travel. Against this, the trumpets act as markers—signals, echoes, and luminous points—cutting through the electronic continuum. In the final moments, live electronics stretch and dilate time itself, arriving at a sonic analogue of the image we now see: a moment of stillness that opens onto vastness, wonder, and the immensity of what remains beyond our understanding.

Scream

Music by Christopher Stark (b. 1980) Text by Edvard Munch (1863-1944)

Composed 2020

Music Copyright 2020 Text Public Domain

Notes from the composer:

Scream takes its title from Edvard Munch's famous painting, "The Scream," which he composed in 1893. The text for the piece comes from Munch's journal in which he describes his inspiration for the painting. The unusual instrumentation of five trumpets, electronics, and tenor voice felt like an apt setting to try and conjure the wild imagery and internal turmoil of this iconic work's origins and description by the artist.

Struck By Stars

Nadje Noordhuis

Composed 2023, Little Mystery Publishing

Notes from the composer:

Struck by Stars is a work for five trumpets and fixed media centered on melody and gently shifting harmony. Clear, song-like lines move between the trumpets, unfolding over warm, slowly evolving chords that create a sense of openness and quiet momentum. The fixed media establishes a spacious harmonic field, while each performer also plays small bells, adding delicate points of resonance and color to the texture. At the heart of the piece is a moment of improvisation where collective voices offer a more personal response within the shared sound world. The music gradually builds toward a luminous, joyful conclusion before easing back into a more inward, reflective state, closing the piece with celestial introspection.

Kelly Rossum

Composer Dates (b. 1970-)

Test Flight

Composed in 2023

Publishing – KRossum Music (BMI)

Improvised Landing

Composed in 2023

Publishing - KRossum Music (BMI)

Featured improvisation: Nadje Noordhus

Space Dust (One, Two, Three)

Composed in 2024

Publishing - KRossum Music (BMI)

Featured improvisations:

Space Dust One – Nadje Noordhuis

Space Dust Two – Kelly Rossum (muted trumpet)

Space Dust Three – Nadje Noordhus (open) & Kelly Rossum (muted trumpet)

Includes manipulated NASA audio - Juno flyby of Jupiter’s moon Ganymede on June 7, 2021

Sitting on the Dock Looking at Stars

Composed in 2006 arranged for Fifth Bridge in 2017

Publishing - KRossum Music (BMI)

Includes manipulated NASA audio - Cassini Crossing Saturn’s Planet Ring Gap on April 26, 2017

Additional recorded tracks used by permission - 612Sides, LLC.

 Credits:

Jason Crafton — trumpet

Gabriel DiMartino — trumpet

Nadje Noordhuis — trumpet and electronics

Kelly Rossum — trumpet and electronics

Peydon Shelton — trumpet

Derek Shapiro — conductor

Brian Thorsett — tenor (track 5)

Produced by Ryan Truesdell

Recorded and mixed by Ryan Streber, Oktaven Audio

Additional recording by Michael Dunston (track 5)

Mastered by David Kowalski