Joseph Martin Kraus was a composer in the classical

Classical period (music)

The dates of the Classical Period in Western music are generally accepted as being between about 1750 and 1830. However, the term classical music is used colloquially to describe a variety of Western musical styles from the ninth century to the present, and especially from the sixteenth or...

 era who was born in Miltenberg am Main

Miltenberg

Miltenberg is the seat of the like-named district in the Regierungsbezirk of Lower Franconia in Bavaria, Germany.- Location :...

, Germany. He moved to Sweden at age 21, and died at the age of 36 in Stockholm

Stockholm

Stockholm is the capital and the largest city of Sweden and constitutes the most populated urban area in Scandinavia. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden, with a population of 851,155 in the municipality , 1.37 million in the urban area , and around 2.1 million in the metropolitan area...

. He is sometimes referred to as "the Swedish Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...

", and had a life span which was very similar to that of Mozart's.
Kraus was born in the central German town of Miltenberg

Miltenberg

Miltenberg is the seat of the like-named district in the Regierungsbezirk of Lower Franconia in Bavaria, Germany.- Location :...

 in Franconia

Franconia

Franconia is a region of Germany comprising the northern parts of the modern state of Bavaria, a small part of southern Thuringia, and a region in northeastern Baden-Württemberg called Tauberfranken...

, the son of Joseph Bernhard Kraus, a County clerk in the Archbishopric of Mainz, and Anna Dorothea née Schmidt.