The orchestra was founded in 1868. Since 1888 it has been playing at the Romanian Athenaeum and performed the first concert in 1889 (with Edward Wachman). For 14 years the orchestra has been led by Dimitrie Dinicu and in 1920 George Georgescu became first conductor and manager, achieving to reorganize and modernize this institution. After George Enescu’s death (in 1955) the orchestra took the composer’s name. In 1991 Cristian Mandeal became General Manager, holding the position of Permanent Conductor since 1987.

The "GEORGE ENESCU" Philharmonic Orchestra collaborated with famous conductors: George Enescu, Ionel Perlea, Constantin Silvestri (General Manager between 1947-1953), Alfred Alessandrescu, Theodor Rogalski, Mircea Basarab, Mihai Brediceanu (General Manager between 1982-1990), Mircea Cristescu, Horia Andreescu, and as guests with Richard Strauss, Pietro Mascagni, Maurice Ravel, Herbert von Karajan, Carlos Kleiber, Karl Böhm, Carlo Felice Cillario, Anatole Fistoulari, Jean Martinon, Carol Szymanowsky, Igor Markevich, Franz Konwitschny, Clemens Krauss, Felix Weingartner, Bruno Walter, Lovro von Matacic, John Barbirolli, Pierre Monteux, Francesco Molinari-Pradelli, Georges Prêtre, Leopold Stokowski, Zubin Mehta, Carlo Zecchi, Roberto Benzi, Ghenadi Rojdestvenski, Witold Lutoslawsky, Krzystof Penderecki, invited soloists being the most renowned artists on international level: Dinu Lipatti, Bela Bartok, Monique de la Bruchollerie, Robert Casadesus, Gaspar Cassado, Artur Rubinstein, Wilhelm Kempf, Sviatoslav Richter, Claudio Arrau, Aldo Ciccolini, Alfred Cortot, Marguerite Long, Yehudi Menuhin, Pablo Casals, Enrico Mainardi, Zino Francescatti, Walter Gieseking, Ruggiero Ricci, Mstislav Rostropovici, David Oistrah, Isaac Stern, Henryk Szeryng, Daniil Safran, Clara Haskil, Silvia Marcovici, Radu Lupu and singers: Feodor Saliapin, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, José Carreras, Ileana Cotrubas, Viorica Cortez, Montsserat Caballé etc. In 1990, Sergiu Celibidache became the Honorary Director of the orchestra!

The "GEORGE ENESCU" Philharmonic Orchestra toured the entire Europe, Japan, South Korea etc. They performed in radio and TV shows, recorded on LPs and CDs for Electrecord (among others, Beethoven’s complete series), for Olympia-London and BMG Ariola (including Brahms’ and Enescu’s complete series) etc.