Christian Benda is a conductor,

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and Defi ...

and

cellist The cello ( ; plural ''celli'' or ''cellos'') or violoncello ( ; ) is a bowed (sometimes plucked and occasionally hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually tuned in perfect fifths: from low to high, C2, G2, D3 ...

, descended from the eighteenth-century Benda family of composers. He performs worldwide both as a soloist and a conductor. His numerous recordings include many classical standards such as Mozart, Rossini and Schubert overtures (notably, particularly distinguished performances of Boccherini cello sonatas, with his brother accompanying on the fortepiano, for the Naxos label) as well as the compositions of his ancestors Georg Anton (Jiří Antonín) Benda,

František Benda František () is a masculine given name of Czech origin. It is a cognate of Francis, Francisco, François, and Franz. People with the name include: *Frank Daniel (František Daniel) (1926–1996), Czech film director, producer, and screenwriter ...

and Jan Jiří Benda. (Another ancestor of his was the conductor

Hans von Benda Hans von Benda (22 November 1888, in Strasbourg – 13 August 1972, in Berlin) was a German conductor. A direct descendant of the eighteenth-century composer Franz Benda, he operated in the shadow of better-known German maestri of his genera ...

, who was particularly active between the 1930s and the 1950s.) He serves as chief Conductor and artistic director of the Prague Sinfonia. Between 2012 and 2014 he recorded a four-volume cycle of

Gioacchino Rossini Gioachino Antonio Rossini (29 February 1792 – 13 November 1868) was an Italian composer who gained fame for his 39 operas, although he also wrote many songs, some chamber music and piano pieces, and some sacred music. He set new standards ...

's complete operatic overtures for

Naxos Records Naxos comprises numerous companies, divisions, imprints, and labels specializing in classical music but also audiobooks and other genres. The premier label is Naxos Records which focuses on classical music. Naxos Musical Group encompasses about 1 ...

with the

Prague Sinfonia Orchestra Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate oc ...

. He was a Climate Ally in the "Tck Tck Tck: Time for Climate Justice" campaign.

References

External links

Benda's Home pageChristianBendaVEVO
Czech composers Czech male composers Czech conductors (music) Male conductors (music) Living people Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century conductors (music) 21st-century Czech male musicians 21st-century cellists {{cellist-stub