Grammy award winning musician Kenwood Dennard having played with the likes of Miles Davis, Herbie Hancock and Dizzy Gillespie also pioneered the jazz fusion improvisational movement in the 70’s with his work with Pat Martino (Joyous Lake) and Brand X (Livestock) and later with Jaco Pastorius and the Word of Mouth band and PDB (Pastorius, Dennard and Bullock) and on his original works with Marcus Miller, Stanley Jordan and Vernon Reed. Maceo Parker’s “Life on Planet Groove” is infectious and arguably one of the best live funk records of all time. Kenwood will surely please any audience that has the pleasure to attend one of his concerts.

He is a musical influence for generations of artists and has performed with many top artists of today including Allman Brothers Band, Phish, String Cheese Incident, Derek Trucks, Moe., Sting, Taj Mahal, Warren Haynes and many more.

He’s featured on over 100 recordings including Sting’s Double Platinum album “Nothing Like The Sun”, Vanessa Williams’ platinum album “The Sweetest Days” and “Miles and Quincy: Live In Montreux” which debuted at #1 on the Billboard Top Jazz Albums and won a Grammy for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Performance and Stanley Jordan’s grammy nominated album “Cornucopia.”

Recently, he’s been on a number of sold out tours with the Stanley Jordan and now that he’s retired from being a professor at Berklee College of Music, he’s bringing his love for improvisation and his jazz fusion roots to life with FWD.

David “Fuze” Fiuczynski is an iconoclastic innovator and a rebel with a guitar. Fluent in funk, rock, fusion, wicked fretless blues slides, Eastern melodicism, Western microtonalism and everything in-between, his remarkably open-minded and versatile approach to his instrument and music in general has made him a “first call” player, and lead to tours and recording projects with a remarkably diverse cast of characters, including Stewart Copeland (The Police), Jack DeJohnette (Miles Davis, John Coltrane), John Zorn, Hiromi, JoJo Mayer, Marc Guiliana (David Bowie), Bernie Worrell (P-Funk), Dennis Chambers, Me’shell NdegeOcello, Rudresh Mahanthappa, Marcus Miller, Billy Hart, John Medeski, Cuong Vu, Ronald Shannon Jackson’s Decoding Society and countless others.

He has played on nearly 100 recordings as a session musician, band leader or band member, been nominated for Grammys with Meshell NdegeOcello and won a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2011 and is a professor at the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston.

“I’m thrilled to be part of FWD, because the blend of hard grooves, vocal lyricisms and experimentalism is something I miss in today’s “mainstream” music. Can’t wait to play and move FORWARD with this group!”

Wes Wirth is a prolific composer, writing for his bass, guitar, and voice, and for many other collaborators. Wes’ unique style has been described as, “visually expansive, a hyperbolic sound-scape, sonically erotic, sensually inviting, and mysteriously tender.” Wes’ inspiration comes from observing, and participating with the elemental forces of nature, and the stunning diversity and cultural beauty in the world. This “music” provides a template for understanding our collective creativity, out-of-the-box thinking, and the connective elements of synergistic phenomena. Wes has recorded and toured with legends such as Chuck Mangione and King Sunny Ade and George Russell, innovators like Hal Crook, and Yazhi Guo, drum masters Rakalam Bob Moses and Kenwood Dennard, and guitar giants Stanley Jordan, Vernon Reid, and David Fiuczynski.