Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova have been career musicians for years—he an intense Irish guitarist and passionate singer, she a poignant Czech vocalist and lifelong pianist. Their music together has almost exclusively been born of film: their debut, The Swell Season, emerged from their work on a Czech comedy entitled Beauty in Trouble, and their worldwide stardom from their starring roles in this year’s indie musical Once. Naming themselves (hurriedly and for lack of a better idea, one might imagine) after their only record, The Swell Season is stumbling to capitalize on their sudden, unexpected fame. As Hansard explained—somewhat baffled—at a recent performance, “I’ve been making music for seventeen years and now, because of this film, the world knows.”

And judging by the size and abject enthusiasm of the sold-out crowd at the duo’s second performance in the nation’s capital this year, the world certainly does know. Hansard and Irglova have graduated from tiny clubs to small arenas in a matter of months—Washington’s gorgeous Lincoln Theatre seats somewhere around two thousand, and the tickets weren’t cheap. After an offbeat, slightly grating introduction by Martha Wainwright, a lone Hansard opened the set under a soft spotlight on a dark stage. Blushing before the screaming audience, he played “Say it To Me Now,” the first song we hear in Once, looking very much like he does when the girl with the broken Hoover hears him for the first time.

That girl (Marketa Irglova, his real-life girlfriend) joined him with a small band of friends and Frames members (covering bass, cello, and violin.) The Swell Season was incredible all night long, but I’m not sure they were ever again as perfectly blended and breathtakingly precise as they were when they launched into “Lies,” a haunting track from their debut. It might have been just the glow of hearing the full band for the first time—Hansard and Irglova’s tight, perfect harmony, accented by gentle piano, shimmering violin, and warm cello.

Hansard is one to introduce every song, and he has more than enough charm to compensate for his amusing inability to articulate. He’d often give three different explanations of the song he was about to play, then conclude, “Actually it’s not about any of that, it’s just about my own selfish bulls—-.” In his thick Irish brogue, he attempted to describe the plotline of “Drown Out”—something about two spirits walking through their darkness in guilt, or no, actually about the general Irish sensation of “feeling guilty for things you didn’t do.” Or maybe it was a mermaid or none of those. Whatever it was supposed to mean, the song was stunning (I’d quote lyrics or describe or something, but it’s simply impossible to convey the magic of the Swell Season’s live renditions). Hansard clearly believes in magic, and the sound he creates is the most convincing proof in the world.

The crowded heeded that song’s reminders about the virtues of excessive volume, covering the intro to “When Your Mind’s Made Up”—the first big song from the film—with deafening applause. Even without the drums that accompany the recorded versions, the song was the most intense moment up to that moment (afterward, Irglova said that she could “see the wood flying off his guitar” while Hansard was strumming passionately). But even that raucous approval didn’t match the response to the tender “Falling Slowly,” indisputably the couple’s “smash hit” if there is such a thing in little-scale indie music. Hansard encouraged the crowd to sing along, but the theater maintained the enchanted, breath-held silence that reigned whenever the pair was singing.

Hansard dismissed Marketa and the band to recycle a few songs from his days in the Frames (“because there aren’t enough Swell Season songs yet,” he explained). But no one seemed to mind; without question, the merch crew’s supply of Frames records took a significant hit after the show. He also threw in his staple Van Morrison cover, “because he’s the greatest Irish songwriter still living.”

The band returned—three more times, counting the double encore—for the rest of the Swell Season catalogue, and the usual cover of the Frames’ lullaby “Star, Star.” Hansard insisted that the audience repeat the refrain (“Star, star, teach me how to shine / teach me so I’ll know what’s goin’ on in your mind”) until it faded to all but a whisper. He and Marketa returned, in the second encore, for a rowdy rendition of Bob Dylan’s “You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere,” which they developed for Todd Haynes’ upcoming Dylan film, I’m Not There. After two hours of music, the swooning audience was the proof: if the Swell Season keeps winning crowds this large, the massive demand for a second record will be as loud as the applause is every time the couple takes the stage.

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Previously in Live: The Bravery (Washington DC), John Butler Trio (Washington DC), Josh Ritter (Washington DC), and St. Vincent (Los Angeles).