Following the announcement earlier this month that highly-regarded Metropolitan Opera maestro James Levine would be unable to finish the music season due to a back injury, the company has decided to appoint a new principal guest conductor, the 51-year-old Italian conductor Fabio Luisi.

Luisi made his Met debut in 2005, conducting Verdis Don Carlo. Since then, he has stepped in occasionally to conduct when Levine has been unable to do so. Luisi's training is in piano performance, which he studied in Paris with the renowned master Aldo Ciccolini, though he has focused on conducting for the past 25 years.

Currently serving as the chief conductor of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, Luisi also held the position of general music director of the Saxon State Opera and the Dresden Staatskapelle orchestra until this February. While he has been under the Met's radar for some time — he had already been scheduled to guest-conduct some performances at the Met next season — his stay is unlikely to be permanent: in 2012, he will become director of the Zurich Opera.

Levine has also been sidelined from his duties as music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, where Luisi serves as a conductor. Levine is expected to recover from his ailments, and neither institution has discussed naming a permanent successor.