The Ghost Jazz Trio is based in San Diego, CA and are 2021, 2022 and 2023 nominees for Best Jazz Album of the Year. All four of their albums have debuted in the top 100 smooth jazz charts four years in a row. The new 2023 ten song album release Groovin Smooth is the fourth album release in four years for the Ghost Jazz Trio and features Ghost Jazz Trio founder/guitarist/composer and producer James Morgan. 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 songs on the album are produced and arranged by Dean Brown. Joining James and Dean on the album are renowned bassist and recording artist Nathan Brown. Nathan has performed and recorded with such notables as Bob James, Earl Klugh, Coco Montoya, Eric Marienthal and many others. Other personnel on the album are piano prodigy Chase Pado, drummer Tres Hodgens.The album was recorded by Grammy winner engineer Alan Sanderson Pacific Beat Recording Studio in San Diego, CA Alan has worked on recordings for the Rolling Stones, Elton John, Michael Jackson and many others.

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, 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. He 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 was the opening act for singer Mickey Thomas of the band Starship. His jazz fusion band Dialog Project achieved quick acclaim in 2013 being nominated for best jazz album ‘Artistry of Jazz Fusion’ and opening for such acts as Allan Holdsworth, Dokken, bassist Stu Hamm and others.

More recently he created his own genre of jazz music he calls “West Coast Laid Back Jazz” that is both relaxing and interesting. James formed the dynamic, and mysteriously named Ghost Jazz Trio, in 2017. Their 2020 debut 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 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 in a smooth jazz groove format. This album is an ensemble driven album. The 2023 album release ‘Groovin Smooth’ album concept, is to feature the natural wood sound of James’s hollowbody Pat Metheny PM2 signature guitar. Little or no effects were used recording the guitar, to showcase the natural sound and beauty of the wood. James uses Thomastik flat wound strings and plays his guitar through a Roland Artist Blues Cube combo amp with 1 x12 speaker and his old Zoom G3X effects unit, using a slight reverb for the album and adding a bit of delay for live performances. All of the songs were recorded by the full band live in the studio, adding some overdubs of solos, and additional ear candy by James, Dean Brown and Chase Pado to enhance the listening experience. All four albums are in the Ghost Store at theghostjazztrioband.com

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