"It's so exciting. Lizzo was here."

Elisapie takes a brief pause between songs to tell the NPR audience how happy she is to be there. In her first visit to the Tiny Desk, the Salluit, Quebec-born and Montreal-based artist delivers a powerful performance of her songs "Arnaq," "Una" and "Darkness Bring the Light," all from her Polaris Prize-shortlisted and Juno-nominated 2018 album, The Ballad of the Runaway Girl.

Released after a six-year break that included having her second child and something that she describes as a feeling that would "just get too heavy," Ballad came after Elisapie took a deep, restorative dive into work by formative Inuk artists from the '60s and '70s, including material from Sugluk as well as Willie Thrasher. The resulting record is a complex, striking mix of original material and covers of Indigenous rock and folk songs, sung in Inuktitut, English and French.

Playing with her in the Tiny Desk session are Jason Sharp (bass saxophone), Joe Grass (guitar), Josh Toal (guitar) and Evan Tighe (drums) — a potent mix when they all come together.