The concert was preceded by a panel discussion featuring prominent guests. Under the title “Wonderland”, Belarusian opposition politician and dissident Maria Kalesnikava, former Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schüssel, and Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann, Member of the European Parliament and Chair of its Committee on Security and Defence, discussed current issues in international security policy. Afterwards, the focus shifted to the power of music as a unifying force across political and geographic boundaries.
The musical part of the programme featured the Munich Chamber Orchestra with concertmaster Daniel Giglberger and violinist Arabella Steinbacher performing works by Luigi Boccherini and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 5 in A major. Soprano Teona Todua took centre stage. With the aria “Porgi, amor” from Mozart’s “Le Nozze di Figaro” and “Fortune ennemie” from Christoph Willibald Gluck’s “Orfeo ed Euridice”, Todua demonstrated her artistic maturity and expressive power. Her luminous high notes, musical differentiation and strong creative power lent the arias a special emotional depth. Todua combined stylistic clarity with personal flair, bringing the characters vividly to life.
Teona Todua is one of the most promising sopranos of her generation. Born in Donetsk with Georgian roots, she first received comprehensive piano training before studying singing at the P. I. Tchaikovsky National Music Academy in Kiev, graduating with a master’s degree in 2022. She attracted international attention early on, winning third prize at the Grandi Voci competition in Istanbul in 2020 and first prize at the Vasyl Slipak competition in Lviv in 2021. In 2024, she was awarded third prize at the Liz Mohn Foundation’s NEUE STIMMEN International Singing Competition – an important step in her international career.
With her performance at the opening concert of this year’s Munich Security Conference, Teona Todua, as a NEUE STIMMEN singer, exemplifies the activities of the Liz Mohn Foundation in promoting excellent young singers and fostering international networking in culture, dialogue and understanding.
