Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola is the perfect place for Bobby Watson to play his first New York gig in several years as a leader. Like Wynton Marsalis, Mr. Watson is a graduate of the Art Blakey school. And though he has worked in many contexts after the Jazz Messengers, Horizon is his most celebrated band, and very much in the Blakey tradition. Mr. Watson and Horizon have recorded a new album, “Horizon Reassembled” (Palmetto 2102), for the label now affiliated with the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra. The only hitch to a hero’s welcome was the weather.

The band was scheduled to open Tuesday night; Mr. Watson was flying in that morning from a gig in Tulsa, Okla. Tuesday’s blizzard delayed Mr. Watson’s flight, however, and completely derailed that of bassist Essiet Essiet, who was forced to land in Baltimore. So Horizon started its first set of the week without its leader but with trumpeter Terrell Stafford, pianist Ed Simon, pivotal drummer Victor Lewis, and substitute bassist Tom Petruchko.

The quartet began with two tunes from the Horizon playbook. “Hey, It’s Me You’re Talking To” was as feathery soft as the snow falling outside; Mr. Stafford switched between open horn and tight harmon mute, sounding like two separate horns. Mr. Stafford never worked with Blakey, but he knows how to get the Jazz Message across, playing in a hard-hitting, powerful style reminiscent of Freddie Hubbard at his height. “I Wanted To Say” was a very aggressive samba, and Mr. Simon doubled the trumpet notes in the treble, also suggesting a second horn.

For the next two tunes, the quartet was joined by a surprise guest, Wessell Anderson, the alto saxophonist with the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, who brought his own quintet into the Vanguard last week. They took on two standards, Duke Ellington’s “In a Sentimental Mood” (which, as Mr. Lewis pointed out, is a classic saxophone song) and the 3/4 “Falling In Love With Love.”

Mr. Watson finally arrived in time to solo on the Richard Rodgers song, and the comparison with Mr. Anderson showed why Mr. Watson is one of the great players of our time. Mr. Anderson is a world-class performer, but Mr. Watson plays with command and authority as well as a distinctive tone, evident from the first note.

Mr. Watson is a true heir to such major postmodern players as Jackie McLean and Gary Bartz. He can also vary his timbre with a bright, bubbly sound that suggests such premodern stylists as Tab Smith and Benny Carter (early on, he played with Panama Francis’s Savoy Sultans and in 1987, he recorded a full-length tribute to Johnny Hodges). And he is an outstanding bandleader, composer, and arranger.

Unfortunately, Mr. Watson was prevented by circumstances from playing his own material on the opening set, which ended with a spirited run through Charlie Parker’s bop warhorse “Confirmation.” Fortunately, the new album contains plenty of examples of Mr. Watson’s skill in these areas. The band’s originals, mostly by Mr. Watson, have very strong melodies, and he is a master at finding new variations on that wellspring of hard bop, the minor-key blues.

Mr. Watson’s own “Dark Days” begins with a rapturous, Hodges-like glissando. Mr. Lewis’s “Eeeyyess” (with a title that suggests the comic Frank Nelson of “Jack Benny” and “I Love Lucy” fame) was fast-and-funky yet quite intricate. The quintet also shines on a jazz and a pop standard: The sprawling, funky melody of Jimmy Heath’s “Gingerbread Boy” is held together in a Blakeylike fashion, and Burt Bacharach’s “The Look of Love” is played in a slow, romantic fashion that straightens out the composer’s metrical oddities.

I was disappointed not to hear any of the music from “Horizon Revisited,” one of the strongest albums in recent memory. The remedy is obvious: a trip back to Columbus Circle soon.

Until March 13 (Jazz at Lincoln Center, 212-258-9595).