[6][7] Fou Ts'ong was born in Shanghai on 10 March 1934 to a family of intellectuals; his father was the translator Fu Lei.

[8] Fou's parents Fu Lei and Zhu Meifu were persecuted during the Cultural Revolution and committed suicide in September 1966.

[9] Fou first studied piano with Mario Paci, the Italian founder of the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra.

[10] In 1958 or 1959, Fou settled permanently in London,[6][14] and soon began giving concerts in Europe and the United States.

[5] Fou was nominated for a Grammy for most promising new classical artist in 1963 for a recording of Scarlatti's sonatas.

[17] He subsequently returned to New York several times; reviewing a 1987 recital at Alice Tully Hall, Bernard Holland of The New York Times described Fou as "an artist who uses his considerable pianistic gifts in pursuit of musical goals and not for show", and noted his "sensitive ear for color and that elusive gift of melody, whereby linear movement stretches and contracts in order to explain harmonic tensions.

"[18] In 1967, Fou performed the Grieg Piano Concerto with the BBC Symphony Orchestra under Sir Colin Davis as part of the First Night of the Proms.

[2] Writing in 1960, Hermann Hesse said of Fou's playing of Chopin that he surpassed the previous masters, Padereweski, Fischer, Lipatti, Cortot.

"[21] James Methuen-Campbell, in Fou's entry in Grove's Dictionary, also notes his interpretations of Debussy, Mozart and late Schubert, highlighting his "delicate touch and keen sensibility".