This past weekend, students from Francis Howell Central travelled to Osage Beach, Missouri for the Missouri All-State Orchestra and Choir. To make it to this point, these students have been rehearsing and auditioning for several weeks.

“The process starts at the school level,” Said senior Sage Russell, who was the only choir student to make All-State. “We had a pre-audition with Mrs. Baird, and she’ll send the top 8 [students] from each part–soprano, alto, tenor, bass–to audition for the Metro 8 district choir.” Metro 8 is made up of the three Francis Howell high schools, all four Fort Zumwalt high schools, and multiple private schools from around the St. Louis area.

To qualify for the All-State Orchestra, it was a similar process.

“I qualified for State by making the district band, and then attending auditions for State,” said senior Laurel Ammond. “I completed the first round [of auditions] I was invited for a second callback audition. Once I did my callback audition, I was placed in Orchestra.”

Despite being the only choir student to qualify for All-State, Russell was not the only student from our school to make it far in the auditioning process.

“They take the 40 students per part, and the top 20 audition for All-State. This year we had ten people from our school get this far,” Russell said. “Last year we only had four, and this is as far as I’d gotten last year.”

Despite all of the stress leading up to making it to All-State, Russell and Ammond were happy with their performances.

“I felt my performance went great. It was beautiful music, and while I didn’t really know anyone in the choir, it didn’t matter. The music we all made together makes you feel like you’ve known them forever.”

For Ammond, she was just as happy with her performance.

“The performance was wonderful! Our concert went really, really well–except when the fire alarm went off in the middle of it,” Ammond said. “All of the music was played really, really well.”

Even with all of the fun they had, Russell’s favorite part of the All-State weekend was the return home.

“Going home [was my favorite part]. All-State was wonderful, but I missed my choir.”

After their success at State, Ammond and Russell have upcoming concerts and performances with band and choir, respectively.

Photo courtesy of Laurel Ammond