Remembering Glen Hansard

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Photos by Matt Jackson

Heartbroken by the news that Glen Hansard has died. I first saw him in 2004, when The Frames opened for Damien Rice at The Odeon in Cleveland. Still largely unknown in the U.S. at the time, they began quietly with the song “Keepsake.” After five minutes of slow-burn tension, Glen shouted off mic, the band erupted into a Godspeed You! Black Emperor-like frenzy, and I was a fan for life.

It’s difficult to overstate the importance of his music to me and its influence on my own. As a solo singer/songwriter, I always seemed too rock for folk and too folk for rock. Glen was the only comparable example I could point to--though when I was most-active, he wasn’t yet well known enough for the reference to resonate with music business gatekeepers.

That changed in 2008, when he and his Swell Season songwriting partner, Markéta Irglová, won the Oscar for Best Original Song. (If you ever want to be inspired as an unknown artist, look up their acceptance speeches on YouTube!) I’d been playing “Falling Slowly” at cafe gigs since seeing them perform it from the lip of the stage at the Southpaw in Brooklyn in 2006. Look closely at the audience photo my friend @mattjacksonstudios snapped and you can see me--likely while Glen played my request, “Finally,” still one of my five favorite rock songs. It was our second consecutive night seeing Glen and Markéta in small NYC clubs. Three months later, ONCE premiered at Sundance and changed their lives.

The next time I saw them, I was still in the front row--but the venue was much larger. Altogether, I saw Glen around 10 times. Highlights included The Frames at the Beachland Ballroom in 2005; Glen opening solo-acoustic for Eddie Vedder at Detroit’s Fox Theatre in 2011; and most recently, playing a full-band set before Pearl Jam at Wrigley Field in 2024.

He won me over instantly with his passionate performance style, as he did countless others. For more than 20 years, I watched his songwriting deepen and admired the grace with which he carried his growing recognition. I am deeply saddened by this loss and profoundly grateful for the songs and legacy he left behind.