WDCB Live Broadcast: Chicago Jazz Festival 2026 | Kevin Fort/Andy Brown Duo Album Release

Join us for a live WDCB studio broadcast to celebrate Chicago’s 2026 Jazz Festival! The program will feature the Kevin Fort & Andy Brown Duo. Hosted by Leslie Keros. Chicago jazz artists Kevin Fort and Andy Brown bring together two distinctive voices rooted in the straight-ahead jazz tradition. Pianist and composer Kevin Fort is a faculty member at Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Music and has performed with artists including Bob Brookmeyer, John Clayton, James Moody, Phil Woods, Steve Turre, John Pizzarelli, Harry Allen and Melissa Aldana. Guitarist Andy Brown, described by the Chicago Tribune as “one of Chicago’s most appealing jazz guitarists,” has been a fixture on the Chicago jazz scene for more than two decades, performing regularly at venues including the Green Mill, Andy’s Jazz Club and Winter’s Jazz Club and working with artists such as Scott Hamilton, Howard Alden, Harry Allen, Anat Cohen and Michael Feinstein. Together, Fort and Brown share a deep appreciation for melody, swing and spontaneous musical conversation. Their new album, Chiaroscuro, to be released September 4th on JeruJazz Records, is an intimate piano-guitar duo recording inspired in part by the classic Bill Evans/Jim Hall album Undercurrent. The title refers to the Italian visual-art term for high contrast light and dark in painting. Kevin and Andy use that idea musically, exploring the contrast between piano and guitar, percussive attack and warm sustain, harmonic density and linear clarity, shadow and illumination. A book editor and jazz and blues maven, Leslie Keros is the midday host of ‘DCB Jazz. She is a native of the Detroit area and has been steeped in music since childhood, taking classical piano lessons from age 7 throughout her school years, singing in youth and adult choirs, and attending fine arts camp every summer until high school. She entered college intending to be a music major but was seduced by English literature, a romance that eventually spawned a career in book publishing. In 2000, Leslie began hosting shows featuring her favorite jazz and blues artists at area radio stations. She joined WDCB in 2010 as a cohost of Blues Edition on Saturday nights, and has since enjoyed hosting both jazz and blues shows as well as producing occasional pieces for The Arts Section. Presented by WDCB 90.9 FM, Chicago’s Home for Jazz!