Kuerti conducts at Tanglewood as Levine awaits surgery

Canadian Julian Kuerti, who is assistant conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, is one of the conductors who will step in for James Levine at Tanglewood this summer.

Levine, music director of the BSO, has withdrawn for the remainder of the 2008 Tanglewood season because he requires surgery to remove a cyst on his kidney.

Tanglewood, in Lenox, Mass., the summer home of the BSO and a respected classical festival, offers 67 ticketed performances throughout the summer.

Kuerti, the young Toronto native who took up the post of assistant conductor at the BSO last October, conducted a concert this weekend of the BSO with pianist Peter Serkin. Bach's Piano Concerto No. 1, Mozart's Concert Rondo in D and Haydn's Symphony No. 104 were on the program.

Kuerti is the son of world-renowned pianist Anton Kuerti and cellist Kristine Bogyo, founder and director of Toronto's Mooredale Concerts. He trained at Tanglewood under Levine before he was offered the BSO post.

Others scheduled to fill in for Levine include Leonard Slatkin, David Zinman, John Oliver, Ryan Wigglesworth, Jeffrey Milarsky and Oliver Knussen.

Shi-Yeon Sung, the first woman to hold an assistant conductor position with the BSO in the orchestra's 127-year history, will make her BSO debut this week leading the orchestra in Schumann's Piano Concerto in A minor with Garrick Ohlsson as soloist.

Levine said he needed to have the surgery, which requires six weeks of recovery, this summer, so he can return in time for the BSO and Metropolitan Opera season openings in September.

"It is extremely frustrating that I need to have this surgery now," Levine said in a statement. "My projects at Tanglewood have been planned so carefully and co-ordinated in such detail by the festival administration. I especially regret not being here with Elliott Carter for his 100th birthday celebration, which I was looking forward to more than I can say."

Levine conducted the BSO in the opening of its Tanglewood season last weekend in a concert performance of Berlioz's Les Troyens.