During summer vacation, ten students from West Madison Elementary School will be rehearsing for a fall music festival.

West Madison Honor Choir members are Courtney Allen, Meghan Hall, Tamya Oates, Anna Crouse, Soji Bedsole, Caleb Moyers, Jean-Pierre le Roux, Alyssa Thompson.

For the first time, music teacher Kristina Newsome selected 10 vocalists to form the West Madison Honor Choir.

Honor choir members are Courtney Allen, Soji Bedsole, Anna Crouse, Skylar Elliott, Emily Geary, Meghan Hall, Caleb Moyers, Tamya Oates, Jean-Pierre le Roux and Alyssa Thompson. These students will enter fifth grade in August.

“We are in the phase of getting and distributing music for summer practice. They will rehearse over the summer on their own,” Newsome said. “When school starts back, we will rehearse as a group.”

In September, the West Madison Honor Choir will travel to Birmingham for the Alabama Music Education Association (AMEA) Elementary Music Festival, a statewide gathering of honor choirs who will perform a joint concert.

Honor choir members are expected to rehearse three times each week and memorize each song that they will perform at the festival. “Some weeks will be easier than others and that’s understandable,” Newsome said. She is posting links for AMEA music and instructions on her personal website.

“We may try to schedule a rehearsal sometime in August before school starts back since we’re having a late start this year,” she said.

The AMEA festival will be held in the Wright Center at Samford University with clinician Dr. Rollo Dilworth. He is associate professor of choral music education at Temple University’s Boyer School of Music in Philadelphia. Dilworth has written and arranged more than 150 choral works that are currently in print.

He frequently serves as a guest conductor and clinician for honors, festival and all-state choirs throughout the United States and abroad.

The performance pieces will include “The Dream Keeper,” “Hush! Somebody’s Callin’ My Name,” “Exsultate Justi” and “John Henry” (Rollo Dilworth); “Three Quotes by Mark Twain” (Andrea Ramsey); “Days of Quiet Joy” (Paul Basler); and “Old Woman and Her Cat” (Ruth Henderson).