Boston Sets Season: Conductor T.B.A.

The management of the Boston Symphony Orchestra has said that it has no idea what shape its music director, James Levine, will be in after his next round of surgery for lower-back problems, let alone whether other medical issues are likely to crop up as they have in recent seasons. And Mark Volpe, the orchestra's managing director, who scrambled to fill an empty podium when Mr. Levine had rotator-cuff surgery in 2006, kidney surgery in 2008 and an operation on a herniated disk, near his neck, early this season, has said that he and Mr. Levine have to have some ''frank conversations about what's possible.'' But this is the time of year when musical institutions announce their plans for the coming season, in the hope of getting subscribers to sign up early for a slate of concerts. Now the orchestra has announced a 2010-11 season that counts on Mr. Levine to be on hand for some demanding programming, including three Mahler symphonies, a double bill of Bartok's ''Bluebeard's Castle'' and Stravinsky's ''Oedipus Rex,'' and the premiere of a new work by Harrison Birtwistle. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]