A Colorful Jason Moran Trio

Jason Moran’s adventurous opening set at the Jazz Bakery on Tuesday night triggered thoughts about the demands facing every young jazz pianist working within the classic trio instrumentation of piano, bass and drums.

Like the classical string quartet, the jazz piano trio contains all the potential of much larger ensembles. But that potential comes with a major challenge: the sparkling history of piano achievements reaching from Jelly Roll Morton and Art Tatum to Cecil Taylor and Bill Evans.

That Moran, still in his 20s, has been able to generate a unique musical persona for himself is testimony to his expanding presence as an important new talent.

At the Bakery, working with longtime associates Tarus Mateen on bass and Nasheet Waits on drums, Moran concentrated on material from his current Blue Note album, “Black Stars.”

Reflecting his omnivorous musical curiosity, the pieces offered a colorful buffet of styles. Moran’s own “Gangsterism on a River” (one of several Moran works using the “Gangsterism” prefix reminiscent of his work with the M-Base musical collective) and “Skitter In” were juxtaposed against Jaki Byard’s “Out Front” and Duke Ellington’s “Kind of Dukish.”

Adding more diversity, Moran combined Ravel’s “Le Tombeau de Couperin” with his own “State of Art,” moving smoothly from Ravel’s floating harmonies into his own, similarly textured phrases.

The playing by all the participants was equally multifaceted. Moran made particularly effective use of a dynamic sense of touch, sometimes hammering his notes, sometimes floating through his lines with an immaculate sense of tone. And when he played an utterly idiosyncratic version of “Body and Soul,” he suggested one of the possibilities for new perspectives on standard tunes.

Harkening back to the question of how a young artist deals with the rich history of the piano trio, Moran’s interaction with Mateen and Waits suggested that he is determined to follow an equally innovative path in that area as well. Breaking up song structures, throwing the lead back and forth to the other players, using bass and drum solos for dramatic emphasis in unexpected places, he sounded very much like a player with a compellingly original creative agenda.

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Jason Moran Trio at the Jazz Bakery, 3233 Helms Ave. Today through Sunday at 8 and 9:30 p.m. $25. (310) 271-9039.