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Glen Hansard, the Irish folk-rock musician and actor who fronted the band the Frames and had Oscar-winning success with the 2007 film Once, has died aged 56.
He died in a motorcycle crash in Lucan on the outskirts of Dublin, early on Wednesday morning. Without naming him, Irish police said he was treated at the scene for his injuries but died a short time later.
Hansard won the Oscar for best original song for Falling Slowly, the centrepiece of Once, which starred Hansard opposite another real-life musician, Markéta Irglová, playing two struggling musicians in Dublin who embark on a tentative romance; Irglová co-wrote the song and shared the Oscar with Hansard. Once was then successfully adapted into a stage musical in 2011.
Hansard was also the frontman of the Frames, who released six studio albums, including 2004 Irish chart-topper Burn the Maps.
A statement from Hansard’s representatives reads: “Glen’s family is deeply shocked and heartbroken by this tragic loss and respectfully requests privacy at this extremely difficult time. The family is grateful for the support they have received and wishes to thank the emergency services who attended the scene. As this matter remains the subject of an active Garda investigation, no further comment will be made at this time.”
Among those paying tribute was Ireland’s culture minister, Patrick O’Donovan, who said: “Few artists made as big an impact on modern Irish storytelling … Hansard consistently poured passion and vulnerability into every note. His impact will last generations in Irish music, even as his life has ended far too soon.”
Hansard had genuinely lived Once’s story of a busker down on his luck: he had started out performing on the streets of Dublin, having dropped out of school early.
He formed the Frames in his late teens, named for his hobby of fixing up bicycle frames which populated his back garden. His mother secured a bank loan for their earliest recordings: “She went to the bank manager and asked could she get the house done up,” Hansard later said.
Buoyed by being signed to Island Records, he recruited a range of local musicians and they released their debut Another Love Song in 1991. Island dropped them, without foreseeing the band’s growing potential: subsequent albums became more and more popular, and they caught the ear of legendary recording engineer Steve Albini who oversaw their first Irish Top 10 release, 2001’s For the Birds. Its followup Burn the Maps hit No 1 and their final studio album The Cost reached No 2.
The Cost featured the Hansard-Irglová duet Falling Slowly, which the pair also recorded in their duo the Swell Season, who had formed away from the Frames. Irglová met Hansard when she was in her mid-teens, after her father promoted Frames concerts in her native Czechia, and she was invited to contribute backing vocals.
The film Once was written and directed by John Carney, who had once played bass in the Frames, and who signed up Irglová as one of the leads, with Cillian Murphy being courted for the male lead. Murphy turned down the role, leading Carney to cast an initially reluctant Hansard, who had only acted once before with a role in 1991’s The Commitments.
“I don’t remember having any real connection with the creative process during The Commitments other than showing up on set at the right time and speaking my lines,” Hansard reflected in 2009. “The emotional investment was much higher in Once. It’s just you and your mates and if anyone’s in bad form it’s not going to work, so it was a case of throwing yourself into it completely.”
Despite its small crew and a low budget, Once went on to gross more than $20m worldwide, and Falling Slowly was Grammy-nominated in addition to its Oscar win.
The on-screen romance was mirrored in real life, despite the age gap between Hansard and Irglová, who were 37 and 19 at the time of filming. “I had been falling in love with her for a long time, but I kept telling myself she’s just a kid,” Hansard said, with Irglová saying: “The friendship and connection that you’re watching on screen between Glen and I exists, and it did grow into a deeper love afterwards.”
They split in 2009, the year they released second Swell Season album Strict Joy, though a documentary was made about the pair in 2011 and they reunited as musicians for a third album, 2025’s Forward. They also recorded a song in 2022, Take Heart, with Ukrainian refugees.
The Frames became less of a focus for Hansard after his Once success – though new songs were recorded for the 2015 compilation album Longitude – and beginning with 2012’s Rhythm and Repose, he released five solo albums.
He did not pursue acting further, but did appear as a voice actor on an episode of The Simpsons, and recorded a song for the soundtrack of The Hunger Games.
In 2023 he had the honour of performing the Pogues’ Fairytale of New York at the funeral of that band’s frontman, Shane MacGowan.
Hansard is survived by his wife, Finnish poet Maire Saaritsa, and their three-year-old son Christy. He spoke of fatherhood in a 2023 interview: “For 52 years I was the most important person in my own life, and then suddenly I got a complete perspective shift, and I’m absolutely loving it.”
Each year, he returned to busking on Dublin’s Grafton Street to raise money for the city’s homeless.
Once went on to have a remarkable second life thanks to its stage adaptation, written by Enda Walsh and directed by John Tiffany. It opened on Broadway in 2012 and was nominated for 11 Tony awards that year, winning eight. It then ran in Dublin and London’s West End, and has since been revived numerous times in globe-spanning productions.
