Events

March 4 – Johann Sebastian Bach revives (for the last time under his leadership) his St John Passion BWV 245 (BC D 2d) with some textual and instrumentational changes at St. Nicholas Church, Leipzig. In it, he uses the contrabassoon for the first time (as a continuo instrument).
March 17 – George Frideric Handel's oratorio Solomon first performed, at the Theatre Royal in London.^[1]
April 27 – The first official performance of Handel's Music for the Royal Fireworks, in London, finishes early due to the outbreak of fire.^[1]
May 27 – Handel stages a benefit concert at and for the Foundling Hospital in London at which the Foundling Hospital Anthem is premiered.
1749–1750 – Bach revises his The Art of Fugue BWV 1080, but the project will be left incomplete by his death and published in 1751 by his son Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach in Berlin).

Popular Music

Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach
- Magnificat (Berlin version)
- Flute Sonata in E major, H.506
Johann Sebastian Bach – Mass in B minor
George Frideric Handel
- Theodora, HWV 68, oratorio (composed, first performed 1750)
- Music for the Royal Fireworks, HWV 351
Niccolò Jommelli – La cantata e disfida di Don Trastullo (secular cantata)

Michel Corrette – Les Amusemens du Parnasse (Methods books that were published in 8 volumes from 1749–1772)
Francesco Geminiani – A Treatise of Good Taste in the Art of Musick
Philipp Christoph Hartung – Musicus Theoretico-Practicus
Friedrich Wilhelm Marpurg – Der critische Musicus an der Spree
Johann Mattheson – Abhandlung von den Pantomimen

January 16 – Vittorio Alfieri, librettist and dramatist (died 1803)
March 10 – Lorenzo Da Ponte, Italian librettist (died 1838)
May – Elisabeth Soligny, French ballerina and ballet mistress
May 5 – Jean-Frédéric Edelmann, composer (died 1794)
June 15 – Georg Joseph Vogler, (known as Abbé Vogler) German composer, teacher and theorist (died 1814)
August 21 – Edvard Storm, librettist and poet (died 1794)
August 28 – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, librettist and writer (died 1832)
September 1 – Lorenz Leopold Haschka, librettist and writer (died 1827)
October 4 – Jean-Louis Duport, composer and cellist (died 1819)
December 17 – Domenico Cimarosa, composer (died 1801)
December 30 – Anton Kraft, Czech composer (died 1820)
date unknown – Marija Zubova, composer (d. 1799)