"How deep is the ocean?” “What is this thing called love?” Jazz singer-songwriter Allegra Levy may not have all the answers, but she sure has plenty of questions. Her latest album, Out of the Question, is composed entirely of songs in search of answers, from “Where Are You Going?” to Carole King’s “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?”

This new project was the brainchild of Levy’s longtime collaborator, pianist Carmen Staaf, a winner of the Mary Lou Williams jazz piano competition, who currently serves as musical director for DeeDee Bridgewater. “Carmen pointed out that some of the most beautiful songs are questions, not answers, and I became fascinated with the concept,” Levy says. “As I get older, I find that it really is more about the questions.”

The question remained what songs to choose. Although there were countless cross-genre standards to choose from — from Irving Berlin’s flapper-era “What’ll I Do?” to Michel Legrand’s haunting 1969 melody “What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?” — the album also includes two classic instrumental numbers for which Levy wrote lyrics: “Are You Real?” by Benny Golson, and Horace Silver’s “Que Pasa?”

There are two of Levy’s originals as well, entitled “What’s In a Name?” and “What Are You Waiting For?” The latter is a sort of musical pep talk about going for what you want rather than waiting for dreams to magically come true. “It’s a message I want to pass on to newcomers and other young women on the scene,” Levy says, “to make your own dreams and shape your own existence, because nobody is going to hand it to you."