Born in Paris, the daughter of pianist Fanny d'Almeida (disciple of Elie Delaborde) and organist William Gousseau (1870-1939), maître de chapelle at Saint-Nicolas-du-Chardonnet (1893-1938), Gousseau entered at a young age in the Conservatoire de Paris where she won a first prize in piano in the class of Lazare-Lévy (1925) - who regarded her as one of her best disciples along with her contemporary Monique Haas - as well as a first prize in Music History in Maurice Emmanuel's class (1926) Récipient of the Claire Pagès Prize (1928), laureate of the III International Chopin Piano Competition of Warsaw (1937), Gousseau also received the Albert Roussel Prize (1939), a composer of whom she was the privileged performer (even today, her recordings of the Concerto, the Suite Op.
are authoritative) Soloist with major national and international ensembles (debut with the orchestras of Boston, New York and Philadelphia in 1952), Gousseau particularly distinguished herself in the French music of her time: Chausson, Dukas, Ohana, Schmitt, creating, in particular, the Passacaille by Marcel Mihalovici (Op.
105) and the étude Pour les sonorités de la main gauche by Henri Martelli, two pieces of which she was the dedicatee - although she played and recorded Brahms, Chopin, Schumann and Falla.
Anne Queffélec, Émile Naoumoff, Jean-Pierre Ferey, Maria Tortelier-de la Pau, Alain Raës [fr], Pascal Devoyon and Kaoki Kimura were among her numerous pupils.
Camille Saint-Saëns, piano concerto n°4, Lélia Gousseau, piano,Orchestre National de la RTF, conducted by André Cluytens (Live 11/12/1956).