Ghost Jazz Trio Story

                                                         Updated 12/21/2023

The Ghost Jazz Trio is San Diego's only charting jazz band on the smooth jazz and jazz charts. Ghost Jazz Trio are 2021/2022/2023/2024 nominees for "Best Jazz Album"  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 the trio features founder/guitarist/composer and producer James Morgan. (performed or recorded with Dean Brown, Gary Husband, Hadrien Feraud, Eric Marienthal and opened for Allan Holdsworth, 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 drummer Jack Nathan (Invisible Time, On the Level, Dreams Above albums), bassist Lance Jeppesen and pianist Chase Pado (On the Level, Dreams Above, Groovin Smooth albums).

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 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 GO Records is the fourth album release in four years from the Ghost Jazz Trio and was nominated for 'Best Jazz Album of the Year' by the San Diego Music Awards and features James Morgan on guitar. On this new release James is joined by guitarist, producer and educator Dean Brown, who co-wrote many of the songs and plays guitar, keys, synth and percussion on the album. All the music on the album was produced and arranged by Dean Brown. 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 started listening to Return to Forever, John McLaughlin’s Mahavishnu Orchestra, and Miles Davis and other emerging jazz fusion artists, inspiring him to take up the guitar. In the late seventies James was fortunate enough to take guitar lessons from Bill Connors of Return to Forever fame.  James lived in Santa Cruz, CA and drove to Half Moon Bay weekly to take lessons whereby he formed a close friendship with Bill.  

James 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 small music venues and restaurants, building the GJT brand. 

The 2020 album ‘Invisible Time’ 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.

The second album “On the Level” released in 2021 featuring guest artist, 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 trio. 

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.