Wally West is an award-winning and critically acclaimed musician who embraces a unique and deep-rooted passion for the performance and teaching of music. He is a graduate of Berklee College of Music in Boston, MA.
He is the co-founder and Administrative Director of The Piedmont Triad Jazz Orchestra, North Carolina's most exciting and unique big band. Wally also serves as music director and project coordinator for the John Coltrane Jazz Workshop in High Point, NC, one of the state’s most successful summer jazz camps that will celebrate its 18th edition this summer.
His performing career has carried him all across the United States, Europe, Asia and the Caribbean, touring, recording, and performing with such popular acts as Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, The Four Tops, The Temptations, The Spinners, The O’Jays, Joe Williams, Lou Rawls, Michael Feinstein, Marvin Hamlisch, and Natalie Cole, as well as Arturo Sandoval, Branford Marsalis, Tony Bennett, Mercer Ellington, Herb Ellis, Charlie Byrd, Carl Fontana, Bobby Shew, Ellis Marsalis, John Pizzarelli and numerous other jazz and popular artists. Additionally, he has also performed across the United States as a member of the USO Jazz Orchestra and the USAirways Jazz Orchestra, performing for presidents Gerald Ford, George H. W. Bush, and Bill Clinton, and countless other entertainment, political and military dignitaries. Wally performs regularly with the Greensboro, Winston-Salem and North Carolina Symphonies for their POPS Concert Series.
Wally is visible on the Motown, Summit, EMI, Rockhouse and New Moon record labels as a recording artist.
Wally's wife Cathy is the Coordinator of Music and Arts at Christ United Methodist Church in Greensboro, where they are members. Their son Aaron is a 2020 graduate at Appalachian State University, majoring in Music Industries with a concentration in Recording and Music Production.