Simply put, Pasquale Grasso’s solo and trio recordings devoted to Bud Powell, Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, and Charlie Parker have set a new standard for jazz guitar—and the standard was already rather high. He brings that same formidable technique and musical insight to this set focusing mainly on the bebop canon as established by Parker and Dizzy Gillespie. Backed by his trio mates Ari Roland on bass and Keith Balla on drums, Grasso does things on his instrument that no one does: playing not only the melody of “A Night in Tunisia,” for instance, but also all the song’s inner contrapuntal parts at the same time—not as a trick, but to highlight the depth and nuance of the composition. He’s almost comically relaxed at the fastest imaginable tempos, conquering Gillespie’s “Be-Bop” and the utterly impossible “Shaw ’Nuff” with no fuss whatsoever. But Grasso knows how to keep things varied and get to the emotional core behind the technical display. He invites vocalist Samara Joy as a guest on the breezy swinger “I’m in a Mess,” from a more obscure corner of the Gillespie catalog. With “Lamento Della Campagnia,” he borrows a page from Billie Holiday’s 1939 recording of “Some Other Spring,” an anchor for Grasso in hard times. The approach is unabashedly traditionalist, and no less inventive and fresh for that. Grasso’s work makes a compelling case that jazz can be both.