Doctors upbeat on Levine's cancer diagnosis

A growth on a kidney removed from conductor James Levine last week was malignant but no further treatment is needed, the Boston Symphony Orchestra's managing director Mark Volpe said in a news release Tuesday.

Levine, music director of the BSO and the Metropolitan Opera, had his right kidney removed in a New York hospital because the growth was causing pressure and discomfort.

A routine biopsy found the growth to be malignant but, doctors said, it was very small and had not spread to surrounding tissues, blood vessels and lymph nodes, and it was caught early.

In the statement, Levine's brother, Tom Levine, said he and his brother were relieved by the doctors' report, and added that his brother is in good spirits and recuperating at home.

Levine will have to miss the remainder of the BSO's summer Tanglewood Music Festival in Lenox, Mass., that runs until the end of August. But he remains scheduled to conduct the opening of the 2008-09 seasons of the BSO and the Met in September.

Levine, who conducts seated on a chair, has recently had other health problems. He has had sciatica, and in March he tore the rotator cuff in this right shoulder when he tripped and fell on the stage of Boston's Symphony Hall during ovations following a performance.

On June 23, the BSO celebrated Levine's 65th birthday with a special podcast chronicling his life from a young piano prodigy to his appointment as BSO's music director in 2004.