1546 in music

• January 1 – Arnold von Bruck retires from his position as Kapellmeister at the Viennese court.
• May - Cipriano de Rore appointed maestro do cappella at the court in Ferrara, a post he held until 1559.
• Jacquet de Berchem appointed maestro di cappella at Verona Cathedral

• Giulio Abondante - Intabolatura di Iulio Abondante sopra el lauto de ogni sorte de balli, the first of three extant books of lute music published in Venice by Antonio Gardano
• Paolo Aretino – Pie ac devotissime Lamentationes Hyeremie prophete tum etiam Passiones Hiesu Christi Dominice Palmarum ac Veneris Sancti (Venice: Angelo Gardano), a collection of litanies
• Jacquet de Berchem – First book of madrigals for five voices (Venice: Antonio Gardano)
• Simon Boyleau – Madrigals for four voices
• Antoine de Mornable
  • Motetorum Musicalium, book 1, for four voices (Paris: Pierre Attaingnant)
  • 17 Psalms for four voices (Paris: Pierre Attaingnant)
• Alonso Mudarra - 'Three Books of Music for vihuela in tablature' (Seville: Juan de Leon)
• Caspar Othmayr – Epitaphium D. Martini Lutheri for five voices (Nuremberg: Johann vom Berg & Ulrich Neuber)
• Girolamo Parabosco – Madrigali a cinque voci (Venice: Antonio Gardano)

• Giovan Tomaso di Maio – Canzone villanesche a 3, book 1

• date unknown – Luca Bati, Italian composer (died 1608)
• September 3 - Isabella Bendidio, Italian noblewoman and singer (died 1610)
• October5 - Cyriakus Schneegas, German Lutheran pastor, hymn-writer, composer and music theorist (died 1597)

date unknown - Joachim a Burck, German hymn writer, composer, organist and Kantor (died 1610)

• Fridolin Sicher (56), organist and composer, died in Bischofszell, Switzerland.