Though Kraus became the most influential Swedish musician of the eighteenth century, he was born and educated in Germany, and lived only eight years in Stockholm before his early death at the age of 36. Yet in that brief period he had taught composers and created the Swedish school of opera. Kraus's symphonies feature the unexpected and many forward-looking stylistic devices that anticipate music of next century. The Symphony in D major (VB143) and the Symphony in F major (VB145) remarkable for many unusual harmonic surprises, extreme textural contrasts, and a sense of drama. Even the Riksdagsmusiken, written for the convening of the Swedish parliament in March 1789 by King Gustav III, was for Kraus the ultimate dramatic symphony.