James Morgan's Ghost Jazz Trio/Quartet is San Diego's only charting jazz band on the smooth jazz and jazz charts. James Morgan's four albums were 2021/2022/2023/2024 nominees for "Best Jazz Album of the Year"  by the San Diego Music Awards. The Ghost Jazz Trio closed out 2023 at #73 on the year-end top 100 albums of 2023 on the smooth jazz charts. https://www.smoothjazz.com/charts/yearend

Based in San Diego, CA James Morgan, is the founder for the Ghost Jazz Trio. James Morgan has performed and recorded with Dean Brown, Gary Husband, Hadrien Feraud, Eric Marienthal and opened for Allan Holdsworth and Stu Hamm.

James's current lineup for live performances are bassist and recording artist Nathan Brown. (performed and recorded with such notables as Bob James, Earl Klugh, Coco Montoya, Eric Marienthal). Other personnel that perform regularly with James Morgan are bassist Lance Jeppesen, pianist Chase Pado who performed on the albums On the Level, Dreams Above, Groovin Smooth, and drummers Tres Hodgens on the album Groovin Smooth, and drummer Casper Paludan.

All of the compositions on the 2020, 2021, 2022 albums are composed, arranged and produced by James Morgan, and all three albums were nominated for "Best Jazz Album of the Year" by the San Diego Music Awards. All four Ghost Jazz Trio albums debuted in the top 100 smooth jazz charts four years in a row including the latest 2023 album Groovin Smooth, nominated for best jazz album of the year and released on Guitar One Records. The album was produced and arranged by guitarist Dean Brown, who also plays guitars on the album and co-wrote many of the songs.

All four albums were recorded, edited and mastered by Grammy winner recording engineer Alan Sanderson at Pacific Beat Recording Studio in San Diego, CA 

The latest 2023 ten song album release Groovin Smooth on Guitar One Records is the fourth album release in four years from James Morgan, and was nominated for 'Best Jazz Album of the Year' by the San Diego Music Awards. On this new release James is joined by legendary guitarist, producer and educator Dean Brown. All the music on the album was produced and arranged by Dean Brown and James Morgan. Joining James and Dean on the album are bassist Nathan Brown, pianist Chase Pado, drummer Tres Hodgens.

James Morgan grew up in northern California, and as a teen in the 1970s started listening to bands like Return to Forever, John McLaughlin’s Mahavishnu Orchestra, Jean Luc Ponty, Weather Report, and other emerging jazz fusion artists of that time, inspiring him to take up the guitar. 

In the late seventies James was fortunate enough to take guitar lessons from legendary jazz rock guitarist Bill Connors of Return to Forever fame.  James lived in Santa Cruz, CA and drove to Half Moon Bay weekly for guitar lessons, whereby he formed a close friendship with Bill.  

James Morgan went on to become a bandleader throughout the following decades, writing his own compositions whilst forming various jazz fusion bands along the way, including his band Absolute Black, which opened for singer Mickey Thomas of Starship in the mid 90s. From  2009 to 2016 his jazz fusion band Dialog Project performed live and recorded a couple albums which achieved quick acclaim, being nominated for best jazz album of the year by the San Diego Music Awards. Dialog Project opened for such acts as Allan Holdsworth, Dokken, bassist Stu Hamm and others.

More recently James created his own genre of jazz music “West Coast Contemporary Jazz” that is both relaxing and interesting. James formed the dynamic, and mysteriously named Ghost Jazz Trio in 2017, performing locally in San Diego, CA for corporate and private events as well as music venues and restaurants, building the Ghost Jazz Trio brand. 

Morgan's first Ghost Jazz Trio album released in 2020, titled ‘Invisible Time’. This album was a complex and synergetic production that achieved critical acclaim and outstanding success in a short period of time, culminating in being nominated for ‘Best Jazz Album of The Year’ by the 2021 San Diego Music Awards and was featured on more than 150 radio station playlists worldwide, debuting in the Top 100 on the smooth jazz charts.

Morgan's second album “On the Level” released in 2021 featuring smooth jazz guitarist Patrick Yandall (27 album releases to his credit). The album is an eclectic and spirited journey including elements of vibrant R&B, Smooth Jazz, Funk and Jazz Swing with some complex and intricate jazz arrangements which will demand attention, peak your imagination and raise the awareness of this talented and innovative Southern Californian band. 

The 2022 album ‘Dreams Above’ is an album that James Morgan had envisioned for many years as a concept to combine Jazz and classical symphonic strings (violin & Oboe) in a smooth jazz groove format.
The concept for the 2023 album release ‘Groovin Smooth’ produced and arranged by legendary jazz fusion guitarist Dean Brown, features James Morgan's unique playing style, tone and the natural wood sound of James’s hollow body Pat Metheny Signature guitar.

James uses Thomastik flat wound strings, Roland Artist Blues Cube, Zoom G3X effects unit.

Morgan's latest release in 2024 titled A Soul in Time was on the ballot for the 67th 2025 Grammy Awards, in the best contemporary instrumental album category.