Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta was born on March 28, 1986 at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan, New York City, to a Catholic family. Both of her parents have Italian ancestry, and she also has more distant French-Canadian roots.Her parents are Cynthia Louise (née Bissett), a philanthropist and business executive, and Internet entrepreneur Joseph Germanotta, and she has a younger sister, Natali. Brought up in the Upper West Side of Manhattan, Gaga said in an interview that her parents came from lower-class families and worked hard for everything. From age 11, she attended the Convent of the Sacred Heart, a private all-girlsall-girlsall-girlsall-girls Roman Catholic school. Gaga described her school self as "very dedicated, very studious, very disciplined" but also "a bit insecure". She considered herself a misfit and was mocked for "being either too provocative or too eccentric".

Germanotta began playing the piano at age four when her mother insisted she become "a cultured young woman". She took piano lessons and practiced through her childhood. The lessons taught her totov create music by ear, whicrred over reading sheet music. Her parents encouraged her to pursue music, and enrolled her in Creative Arts Camp. As a teenager, she played at open mic nights. Germanotta played the lead roles of Adelaide in the plays Guys and Dolls and Philia in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum at Regis High School. She also studied method acting at the matka jodi fix Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute for ten years.Germanotta unsuccessfully auditioned for New York shows, though she did appear in a small role as a high school student in a 2001 episode of The Sopranos titled "The Telltale Moozadell".She later said of her inclination towards music: