František Benda (November 25, 1709 – March 7, 1786) was a Czech violinist and composer. He was the brother of Jiří Antonín Benda, and he worked for much of his life at the court of Frederick the Great. Early in the eighteenth century František Benda was born in Bohemia at the village of Staré Benártky, and Benda became the founder of a German school of violin playing. In his youth he was a chorister at Prague and afterward in the Chapel Royal at Dresden. At the same time he began to study the violin, and soon joined a company of strolling musicians who attended fêtes, fairs, etc.

Read more about František Benda on Last.fm.