Opera Omaha began in 1958 as the Omaha Civic Opera Society, an all-volunteer community opera association. In 1961 the company hired its first musical and artistic director, and began to engage visiting stage directors, while using local singers. Presentation of lesser known operas began a trend of innovation. By the early 1970s, the company became fully professional, and the company’s name was changed to Opera Omaha. In 1975, Opera Omaha moved performances to the historic Orpheum Theater, opening with Lucia di Lammermoor, starring Beverly Sills.

The 1980s began a period of dramatic artistic growth. A biennial festival of world and American premieres and neglected masterpieces captured the attention of national and international critics. During the 1980s and early 1990s, Opera Omaha produced the first American stagings of Handel's Partenope, Donizetti's Maria Padilla, and Rossini's Ermione. The company presented the world premieres of Hugo Weisgall's The Gardens of Adonis, Ricky Ian Gordon's Autumn Valentine, and Andrew Lloyd Webber's Requiem Variations. Renée Fleming, Lauren Flanigan, Christopher and David Alden, Denyce Graves and Sheri Greenewald, among others, launched their early careers in Omaha during this time.

Since the 1990s the company has continued its commitment to high production standards, and in 1998 returned to its development of new works with Libby Larsen's Eric Hermannson's Soul, based on a story by Willa Cather. A new opera, entitled Wakonda’s Dream, by acclaimed composer Anthony Davis and Pulitzer Prize-winning poet/librettist Yusef Komunyakaa, had its world premiere in March 2007. In Early 2009, Opera Omaha will present its eighth world premiere, Blizzard Voices, a staged cantata by 2004 Pulitzer Prize winner for music, Paul Moravec, and U.S. Poet Laureate, Ted Kooser. Like Eric Hermannson’s Soul, which is set in rural Nebraska, both the Davis/Komunyakaa and Moravec/Kooser commissions have as their dramatic subjects regional historical resonance.

Moving into the 21st century, the Board of Directors endorsed a new strategic plan that emphasizes quality over quantity, original productions, and smaller productions geared toward specific segments of the community. To initiate this new artistic direction, in 2006, Opera Omaha produced a critically praised and highly imaginative new production of Madama Butterfly, designed by acclaimed visual artist, Jun Kaneko. Among the company’s emerging projects of significance is a new partnership with The Rose Performing Arts Center (Omaha Theater Company for Young People), through which the Opera and Children’s Theater will co-produce All The King's Men, a children’s opera by Sir Richard Rodney Bennett, in January 2008.

In 2007-2008, Opera Omaha will commemorate its 50th anniversary. In celebration, and to fully launch the new strategic plan, Opera Omaha will present a new production of Aida, designed by prominent Omaha artist, Catherine Ferguson. This grand event at the Orpheum Theater will serve as a centerpiece to a season that includes Peter Brook's Adaptation of Bizet's opera, The Tragedy of Carmen and Evenings with Stewart Robertson concerts performed at the Joslyn Art Museum, Witherspoon Auditorium. It is the intention of Opera Omaha to create diverse opera programming which involves more specialized small programs designed to reach distinct market segments. To increase the capacity of the Opera in order to advance this new plan, in January 2006 the Opera Omaha Board of Directors merged with the Opera Omaha Foundation Board to strengthen the organization’s resources to build support for these exciting changes.

Since the early 1990s Opera Omaha has also presented educational and outreach programming in schools and communities throughout the region. These efforts have greatly expanded since 2002 to include broad public outreach and programs for special constituencies. Opera Omaha’s Community Programs reach approximately 11,000 individuals annually via school and community performances throughout Nebraska, western Iowa and, when possible, into the Dakotas. The company now offers education and outreach through its three-tiered Community Programs: 1) Education, for students in schools from 4th-grade through college; 2) Opera for Everyone, partnerships with social service and other non-profit organizations to involve a broad public in opera despite economic, social or physical limitations; and 3) Opera Insights, free programs presented throughout the year in a variety of locations involving musicians, theater and visual artists, and historians.