The conservatory was established by a royal decree of 1807 in Milan, capital of the Napoleonic Kingdom of Italy.

It opened the following year with premises in the cloisters of the Baroque church of Santa Maria della Passione.

[1] In its 200-year history, the conservatory has educated some of Italy's most prominent musicians and conductors, including Fausto Romitelli, Oscar Bianchi, Luca Francesconi, Stefano Gervasoni, Marco Stroppa, Giacomo Puccini, Alfredo Piatti, Amilcare Ponchielli, Arrigo Boito, Giovanni Bottesini, Alfredo Catalani, Riccardo Chailly, Amelita Galli-Curci, Vittorio Giannini, Scipione Guidi, Bruno Maderna, Pietro Mascagni, Gian Carlo Menotti, Francisco Mignone, Riccardo Muti, Kurken Alemshah, Italo Montemezzi, Feliciano Strepponi, Alceo Galliera, Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli, Giuseppe Andaloro, Mario Nascimbene, Maurizio Pollini, Ludovico Einaudi, Antonino Fogliani, Vittorio Parisi, Riccardo Sinigaglia, Enrique Mazzola, Gianandrea Noseda, and Claudio Abbado.

Other notable students include composers Margrit Zimmermann, Alfredo Antonini,[2] and Alessandro Solbiati, and singers Florin Cezar Ouatu and Paolo Andrea Di Pietro.

Ranking among eminent professors who have taught at the Milan conservatory are Giorgio Battistelli, Franco Donatoni, Lorenzo Ferrero, Riccardo Muti, Enrico Polo, Amilcare Ponchielli, Salvatore Quasimodo, and Alessandro Solbiati.