The electronica/synth-pop musician Katie Stelmanis is better known as Austra (her middle name), and for the past 15 years she has been one of Canada’s best-known musical exports, garnering among other plaudits a Juno nomination and shortlist placing for the Polaris Prize. Austra’s previous (fourth) studio album, Hirudin, was released in 2020, but diehard fans expecting more electropop songs will be surprised – in a good way – by Swan Song.

A feature documentary about the National Ballet of Canada launching a new production of Swan Lake, Austra’s synth-based score draws upon her classical music background (“My first ever experience performing as a kid,” she recalls, “was singing in the orchestra pit for the National Ballet of Canada’s Nutcracker ... My love for Tchaikovsky has sustained ever since”) while also fully engaging with her love of electronica.

Using a mere three instruments (a Juno-106 synthesiser, a Mellotron and her voice), Austra creates 14 tracks that interpolate Tchaikovsky’s music not only through her deeply textured work but also through self-confessed influences from electronic music artists such as Oneohtrix Point Never and Vangelis.

There is more: Kraftwerk’s pristine synth sweeps get a sneaky look in on Corps de Ballet and Genevieve’s Theme, while delicate light and shade are applied to Move to the Theatre (skittish and propulsive) and Siphe’s Theme (despondency writ large). Meanwhile, Bow, the final track (and longest, at almost six minutes), is as electro-elegant a finale as you could wish for.