In jazz, horn players are the romantic leading men, and pianists are more often the showmen. Like his slightly older contemporary, Cyrus Chestnut, Eric Reed is part of a tradition of piano-based crowd-pleasers that goes back to Erroll Garner and Fats Waller – and even earlier. By calling his band the “Happiness Sextet,” Mr. Reed, who is starring this week at Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola, telegraphs his alliance with these keyboard-based entertainers.

The Philadelphia native has brought many kinds of music into New York clubs and concert halls in recent years, including ace recreations of the music of Eric Dolphy and Duke Ellington; accompaniments for outstanding singers like Paula West, Mary Stallings, and Allan Harris; and holiday music (as on the fine “Merry Magic” – Max Jazz 302). He is also my favorite of the several star pianists who graduated from Wynton Marsalis’s ensembles.

When Mr. Reed is making his own music, however, he favors a sound both serious and fun, tightly arranged but with adequate room for solos, one where his sidemen can contribute compositions while he remains in charge. In 2003, Mr. Reed released three albums, one of which was titled “e-bop” (Savant 2051), and that’s a useful term.

His “e-bop” has a lot in common with the hard bop of the 1960s, especially when it was crafted under the aegis of a virtuoso player-composer like Horace Silver or Freddie Hubbard. The Happiness Sextet includes two saxes who have been making their mark around town, Myron Walden (alto and flute) and Seamus Blake (tenor); a trumpeter new to me, Sean Jones (who has just released his debut album); the versatile bassist Dwayne Burno; and drummer Billy Drummond (at 45, the veteran of the group).

Where Mr. Reed wrote most of the music on “e-bop,” the bulk of the tunes on both sets on opening night were by the hornmen. All the pieces, including Mr. Jones’s “In Her Honor” and Mr. Blake’s “On Cue,” had strong melodies; they were more than just short tunes with a lot of blowing: They had transitions and pre-written passages for the rest of the ensemble to play behind the solos, all in the Blue Note hard-bop tradition. The most imposing original was Mr. Drummond’s “Dubai,” an exotic, minor-key melody, in which Mr. Reed’s piano work suggested one of Horace Silver’s Far East suites.

The group also played several standards of both the jazz and Tin Pan Alley variety, including a touching “I Fall in Love Too Easily” (Happy Centennial, Jule Styne), “Evidence” (Thelonious Monk’s “Just You, Just Me” variation), and a reading of the Victor Feldman-Miles Davis “Seven Steps to Heaven” that got faster and faster within each solo. But Mr. Reed outdid himself on a trio reading of “Autumn in New York.”

He started with a florid intro, then outlined the melody as simple and sparely as possible. For a while, he churned out impossibly dense clusters of notes, which were separated by long rests, as if he needed to come up for air. These passages clearly reflected the influence of working with horns, but at other points he spun out long, intricate lines such as no breath-based musician could conceive. It was touching to hear Vernon Duke’s tune – with Yip Harburg’s lyrics, as ever, running in my head – in front of the skyline panorama view at Dizzy’s (foggy though it was).

At one point in the second set, Jazz at Lincoln Center’s main man Wynton Marsalis slipped in, accompanying a familiar-looking man in a dark shirt and light tie, who it took me a few moments to recognize as Clint Eastwood. No attention was paid to these visiting dignitaries – it was all directed toward the bright lights beyond the window and the stars on the bandstand.

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Speaking of good things to look at (and listen to), the cabaret star Ute Lemper is in town. She is the epitome of a sophisticated New Yorker’s idea of what a German uber-diva should be, looking like a post-modern Dietrich and moving like a character in a Bob Fosse musical. Her repertoire transverses both the continents and the decades, with special emphasis on those European composers who have become mainstays of American cabaret, such as Weill and Brel. She achieves what the best cabaret singers are supposed to do: make you feel smarter and more sophisticated.

“Eric Reed Happiness Sextet” until January 16 (Lincoln Center, 212-258-9595). “Ute Lemper: Blood & Feathers” at Cafe Carlyle until February 26 (35 E 76th St., at Madison, 212-570-7189).