It was founded in 1959 by its first music director and conductor, Franz Litschauer.
Its current principal conductor is Ahmed El Saedi.
[1] The Orchestra was founded in 1959 under its first music director and conductor, Franz Litschauer, and from mid-1959 to 1963 it was conducted by the Yugoslavian Serbs Gika Zdravkovitch (1959–1960) and Dushan Miladinovitch (1960–1963) (Serbian: Живојин Здравковић, Živojin Zdravković; Душан Миладиновић, Dušan Miladinović).
Many international guest conductors such as Charles Munch, Yehudi Menuhin, Alexander Frey, Patrick Fournillier, Carlo Zecchi, Otakar Trhlik, Ole Schmidt, Gennady Rozhdestvensky, Janos Kukla, Alain Pâris, Felix Carrasco, and others have led the Cairo Symphony Orchestra.
In April 2009, Israeli-Argentinean conductor and pianist Daniel Barenboim played Beethoven's piano sonata no.