Bulgarian-British-American soprano, researcher, and teacher Theodora Ivanova Nestorova has been hailed as “outstanding” (Cleveland Classical), “the focus of activity” (Boston Music Intelligencer), and “eclectic & unique” (Bulgarian National Television). 

Most recently published as first author in a Journal of Voice article involving her original research on vocal vibrato, Theodora won the Best Poster Award at the National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS) 2022 Conference and in 2020 was awarded the Pan American Vocology Association (PAVA)’s Best Student Presentation. As a scholar, Theodora has presented varied voice science studies at The Voice Foundation’s Symposium, the International Congress of Voice Teachers, the International Physiology & Acoustics of Singing conference, The Voice Foundation’s New Investigator Research Forum, the International Symposium on Performance Science, and the National Opera Association conference. During the 2022-23 season, Theodora will present and perform as McGill’s Research Alive Series First-Prize Winner, and is invited as a featured guest on the NATS Chat Series, VocalFri Podcast, and The Empowered Musician of the Month.  

Theodora is an educator passionate about advocating for cross-disciplinarity and multi-cultural connections within and beyond the field of music. An active pedagogue and clinician, she maintains a private voice teaching and diction coaching (especially Slavic languages) studio while serving as a course lecturer/instructor at Framingham State University. Theodora was nominated to represent McGill and earn a M.B.A. in Arts Innovation, within the 2023 Global Leaders Institute for Innovation Executive Cohort, a think tank for arts changemakers to collaborate for greater community impact and outreach.

The 2018-2019 first-place winner of the American Prize in Vocal Performance (Art Song), Theodora is an avid early and contemporary musician. She has sung the world premiere as the title role, Galatea, in Dean Burry’s Il giudizio di Pigmalione and recorded on the Aparté record label with the Wladigeroff Brothers, at the Bulgarian National Radio, and with the Indictus Project. Theodora has performed with Fermata Chamber Soloists, in the Jordan Hall Liederabend Series, Wien Modern Festival, Bang on a Can, and Emmanuel Music’s The Bach Institute. As one-half of the experimental soprano-cello duo, Pizzicanto, Theodora was invited to serve as a Music for Food Artist Fellow for the 2022-23 season. 

A former Fulbright Scholar, Theodora was a 2018-19 Fulbright Study/Research Grant Recipient to Vienna, Austria, studying MA Lied/Oratorio at the University of Performing Arts and Music Vienna and conducting vocology research. Theodora is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Music (Interdisciplinary Studies & Applied Performance Sciences) at McGill University’s Schulich School of Music and holds a MM (Vocal Pedagogy & Music-in-Education Concentration) from the New England Conservatory (2021), and a BM (Voice Performance/Musicology) from Oberlin College & Conservatory (2018).