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GLEN HANSARD, WHO died this morning, was a household name in Ireland for almost his entire adult life.

He’d been a recognisable figure ever since the cinema release of The Commitments back in 1991, playing the young, pony-tailed guitarist Outspan Foster in the movie adaptation of Roddy Doyle’s tale of an aspiring Dublin soul band.

For some, it seems, he’ll be forever associated with the role; in interviews earlier this year, he recounted how Dubliners were still taking a sneaky pride in greeting him with a hearty “alright Outspan” as he walked around town.

For a generation of Irish indie and alternative rock fans who were teenagers in the 1990s and early 2000s, Hansard will always be best known as the frontman and driving force behind The Frames. The band, which Hansard founded, became renowned for their freewheeling, barnstorming gigs and army of die-hard fans.

For others still, he’s known as the Oscar-winning songwriter, alongside his co-writer Markéta Irglová, of the tender folk ballad Falling Slowly from their movie, Once.

And for last-minute festive shoppers, he’ll always been the guy standing alongside the likes of Bono and Imelda May, leading the sing-alongs at the annual Christmas Eve Grafton Street busk.

Even if you had no particular interest in his musical projects Hansard’s presence in Irish life was inescapable over the last three-and-a-half decades (sometimes literally – I was once stuck from getting to my car on a freezing winter day because he’d shown up in an obscure Liberties car-park to record a charity fundraising video).

But for the many thousands around the world who counted themselves as fans and followers, there was plenty to take an interest in: there was almost always another tour or record around the corner.

Alongside solo albums and gigs, there were regular reunions with Irglová (the duo performed together under the name The Swell Season) and his old bandmates in The Frames.

Across his long musical career he also collaborated with or played alongside an astonishing array of musicians – including the likes of Christy Moore, Bruce Springsteen and Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder.

Long before all that, a teenage Glen Hansard would have been a familiar face to anyone walking the laneways around Grafton Street from the mid-1980s, where he plied his trade as a busker.

From Ballymun in the north suburbs, Hansard famously left school at 13 to chase his dream. As he later recounted, that dream wasn’t necessarily about emulating his early hero, Bob Dylan, by becoming an internationally-known star. It was simply to make a living by playing music.

His mother, Catherine, had a stall on Moore Street in the north city centre. To escape the embarrassment of being spotted by his mam’s friends, a young Hansard made one of his first trips south of the river to take his initial steps in business.

He earned a grand total of 20 pence on that first day, busking off Grafton Street – enough to buy himself a cup of tea.

“It was the first cup of tea I’d ever brought for myself out of playing music,” he later recalled, “and for me it was a very proud feeling”.

A nascent scene built up around the area, with buskers gathering to play late into the night. Amongst that group was a young violinist, Colm Mac Con Iomaire. The pair formed an almost instant musical connection, and The Frames were born.

Throughout the early 90s, Hansard and his bandmates dedicated all their energy to building up the group.

Resources weren’t exactly in ready supply. The band were often so broke, he later told Hot Press, he’d have to look under bushes to find loose change “because we literally had no bus fare and we would be able to get a bag of chips”.

“Every penny of our dole went into band rehearsals.”

In need of a music video for airtime on RTÉ’s alternative music show No Disco, the group recorded a video for their song Revelate via the CCTV system in a local post office.

Eventually, the Irish breakthrough came. Revelate and other songs from their 1995 album Fitzcarraldo became staples of late-night radio and the group built up a steady live following in the years that followed.

For a period around the turn of the millennium, it seemed that every student bedsit or house-share had somehow been issued with a CD copy of Fitzcarraldo and its follow-up, Dance the Devil.

The band were a constant presence at music festivals – and their frenetic live shows meant fans were happy to come back to see them playing in venues around the country year after year.

As they watched peers like Damien Rice go on to major international success, the big international breakthrough never quite happened for The Frames.

But as the band wound down Hansard, somewhat inadvertently, ended up on the cinema screen once again, playing a down-on-his-luck musician in the 2007 film Once.

His old bandmate from the Frames, John Carney, had built up a career as a successful TV and film director since he’d left the music scene and had lined up Cillian Murphy to star in a low budget musical romance set in the world of Dublin buskers.

Murphy, the story goes, pulled out at the last minute. Hansard, who had co-written the songs for the film and recommended Irglová for the female lead, was persuaded to step in.

The movie, of course, went to become a huge international success, picking up multiple awards – including an Oscar for Hansard and Irglová the following year. At 19, Irglová became the youngest person to win an Oscar in a musical category.

Despite the age gap, the pair had developed a real-life romantic partnership as they promoted the film. Despite breaking up in 2009, the pair have reunited intermittently in the intervening years to record and tour.

“I had been falling in love with her for a long time, but I kept telling myself she’s just a kid,” Hansard later said.

The success of the Once (which was adapted into a Broadway musical) and his reputation as a live performer meant Hansard was guaranteed an audience whenever he toured, and could pick and choose his projects and collaborators.

One of his more unusual late career side hustles saw him take up the role of guitarist in The Earthlings, a ‘supergroup’ put together to back Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder on tour, alongside members of the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Jane’s Addiction.

Speaking on radio this afternoon, Colm Mac Con Iomaire, his former musical partner in The Frames echoed a famous quote from The Commitments when asked why the group never managed to make a big international breakthrough.

“Ours was definitely the more poetic arc,” he told Katie Hannon on RTÉ’s Drivetime.

Like all his close friends, Mac Con Iomaire, said, he’d been “hollowed” by news of Hansard’s death.

He said the success of Once and the songs Hansard composed for it had been hugely significant for his bandmate.

“It was really important for Glen – that affirmation, to be playing for large crowds across the world, selling out the Sydney Opera House and Radio City Music Hall in New York. It was great he got the recognition.”

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