The name Leon Botstein means many things—conductor, musicologist, college president, public intellectual—but has he got that swing? Immersed to his jowls in Mitteleuropäisch culture, this über-egghead shines in the music of Mahler; how he’ll wrangle two world-premiere arrangements of Ellington’s music by jazz pianist Marcus Roberts, and negotiate a rhythmic entente with Roberts’ trio and jazz singer Catherine Russell, is anyone’s guess. But it should be fun to find out. —E.E.