COUNTRY music superstar and Hollywood actor Kris Kristofferson has died aged 88 after an incredible six-decade career.
Kristofferson passed peacefully surrounded by family at his home in Maui, Hawaii, on Saturday, a family spokeswoman said.
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Tributes have begun to pour in for Kristofferson who played with Willie Nelson and Johnny Cash and is best known for the hit Me and Bobby McGee.
Country Music Hall of Fame CEO Kyle Young said: “Kris Kristofferson believed creativity is God-given, and those who ignore such a gift are doomed to unhappiness.
“He preached that a life of the mind gives voice to the soul, and his work gave voice not only to his soul but to ours.
“He leaves a resounding legacy.”
Country music wasn’t Kristofferson’s first career choice, having gone through the Army’s elite Ranger School, learning to pilot helicopters and reaching the rank of captain.
After moving to Nashville in 1965, Kristofferson became a janitor at the Columbia Records studio because it would give him a chance to offer his songs to the big-name stars recording there.
He didn’t make a record until he was 33 but became one of country music’s most famous stars.
Starting in the late 1960s, the Brownsville, Texas native wrote such classics standards as Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down, Help Me Make it Through the Night, For the Good Times and Me and Bobby McGee.
He was emboldened during his career by a fleeting backstage meeting with his other idol, country superstar Johnny Cash.
“I’m sure he didn’t remember it,” Kristofferson said, “but to me that moment was electric. He was everything I expected.”
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But he came to play with Cash, Willie Nelson, and Waylon Jennings in the country supergroup the Highwaymen.
As an actor, he played the leading man opposite Barbara Streisand in A Star is Born, but also had a fondness for shoot-out Westerns and cowboy dramas.
Born into a military family in Brownsville, Texas, his dad ascended the ranks to become a major-general in the US Air Force.
Initially, the handsome, athletic Kristofferson was the apple of his parents’ eyes.
He excelled in sport, playing American football and rugby union at a high level.
He even earned a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford University, where he was awarded a blue for boxing.
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