The Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, founded by Otto Nicolai, performs its first concert on March 28, 1842.

Until the 1830s, orchestral performance in Vienna was done by ad hoc orchestras, consisting of professional and (often) amateur musicians brought together for specific performances.

In 1833, Franz Lachner formed the forerunner of the Vienna Philharmonic, the Künstlerverein—an orchestra of professional musicians from the Vienna Court Opera (Wiener Hofoper, now the Vienna State Opera); it gave four concerts, each including a Beethoven symphony.

The Vienna Philharmonic itself arises nine years later,  hatched by a group who meet regularly at the inn 'Zum Amor', including the poet Nikolaus Lenau, newspaper editor August Schmidt, critic Alfred Becker, violinist Karlz Holz, Count Laurecin, and composer Otto Nicolai who was also the principal conductor of a standing orchestra at a Viennese theater.

Mosco Carner will write in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians that "Nicolai was the least enthusiastic about the idea, and had to be persuaded by the others; he conducted the first [concert] on 28 March 1842."

The orchestra is fully independent, consists of members of the Hofoper orchestra, and makes all of its decisions by a democratic vote of its members; it has its day-to-day management handled by a democratically elected body, the administrative committee.