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       Kris Kristofferson, singer-songwriter and actor, dies at 88   
       -----------------------------------------------------------   
       Kris Kristofferson, a Rhodes scholar with a deft writing style   
       and rough charisma who became a country music superstar and   
       A-list Hollywood actor, has died.   
      
       Kristofferson died at his home on Maui, Hawaii, surrounded by   
       family on Saturday, a spokesperson said in an statement. He   
       was 88.    
      
       Starting in the late 1960s, the Brownsville, Texas, native   
       wrote such classics standards as "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down"   
       and "Help Me Make it Through the Night." Kristofferson was a   
       singer himself, but many of his songs were best known as   
       performed by others, whether Ray Price crooning "For the Good   
       Times" or Janis Joplin belting out "Me and Bobby McGee."   
      
       He also starred opposite Ellen Burstyn in director Martin   
       Scorsese's 1974 film "Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore,"   
       starred opposite Barbra Streisand in the 1976 "A Star Is Born,"   
       and acted alongside Wesley Snipes in Marvel's "Blade" in 1998.   
      
       Kristofferson, who could recite William Blake from memory, wove   
       intricate folk music lyrics about loneliness and tender romance   
       into popular country music. With his long hair, bell-bottomed   
       slacks and counterculture songs influenced by Bob Dylan, he   
       represented a new breed of country songwriters, along with such   
       peers as Willie Nelson, John Prine and Tom T. Hall.   
      
       "Kris brought it kind of from the dark ages up to the   
       present-day time, made it acceptable and brought great lyrics -   
       I mean, the best possible lyrics," Nelson told "60 Minutes" in   
       a 1999 segment about Kristofferson. "Simple but profound."   
      
       He was a Golden Gloves boxer and football player in college,   
       received a master's degree in English from Merton College at   
       the University of Oxford in England, and turned down an   
       appointment to teach at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point,   
       New York, to pursue songwriting in Nashville. Hoping to break   
       into the industry, he worked as a part-time janitor at Columbia   
       Records' Music Row studio in 1966 when Dylan recorded tracks   
       for the seminal "Blonde on Blonde" double album.   
      
       At times, the legend of Kristofferson was larger than real life.   
       Johnny Cash liked to tell a mostly exaggerated story of how   
       Kristofferson, a former U.S. Army pilot, landed a helicopter on   
       Cash's lawn to give him a tape of "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down"   
       with a beer in one hand. Over the years in interviews,   
       Kristofferson said that, with all respect to Cash, while he did   
       land a helicopter at Cash's house, the Man in Black wasn't even   
       home at the time, the demo tape was a song that no one ever   
       actually cut and he certainly couldn't fly a helicopter holding   
       a beer.   
      
       In a 2006 interview with The Associated Press, he said he might   
       not have had a career without Cash.   
      
       "Shaking his hand when I was still in the Army backstage at the   
       Grand Ole Opry was the moment I'd decided I'd come back,"   
       Kristofferson said. "It was electric. He kind of took me under   
       his wing before he cut any of my songs. He cut my first record   
       that was record of the year. He put me on stage the first   
       time."   
      
       One of his most recorded songs, "Me and Bobby McGee," was   
       written based on a recommendation from Monument Records founder   
       Fred Foster. Foster had a song title in his head called "Me and   
       Bobby McKee," named after a female secretary in his building.   
       Kristofferson said in an interview in the magazine, "Performing   
       Songwriter," that he was inspired to write the lyrics about a   
       man and woman on the road together after watching the Frederico   
       Fellini film "La Strada."   
      
       Joplin, who had a close relationship with Kristofferson,   
       changed the lyrics to make Bobby McGee a man and cut her version   
       just days before she died in 1970 from a drug overdose. The   
       recording became a posthumous No. 1 hit for Joplin.   
      
       Hits that Kristofferson recorded include "Why Me," "Loving Her   
       Was Easier (Than Anything I'll Ever Do)," "Watch Closely Now,"   
       "Desperados Waiting for a Train," "A Song I'd Like to Sing" and   
       "Jesus Was a Capricorn."   
      
       In 1973, he married fellow songwriter Rita Coolidge and together   
       they had a successful duet career that earned them two Grammy   
       awards. They divorced in 1980.   
      
       He retired from performing and recording in 2021, making only   
       occasional guest appearances on stage.   
      
      
      
      
      
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