At Any Price (2012)

Kristoffer "Kris" Kristofferson is an American country music singer, songwriter, musician, and film actor. He is known for such hits as "Me and Bobby McGee", "For the Good Times", "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down", and "Help Me Make It Through the Night". Kristofferson is the sole writer of most of his songs, and he has collaborated with various other figures of the Nashville scene such as Shel Silverstein. In 1985, Kristofferson joined fellow country artists Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson and Johnny Cash in forming the country music supergroup "The Highwaymen". In 2004, Kristofferson was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. Collection includes: Kristofferson (1970); The Silver Tongued Devil And I (1971); Border Lord (1972); Jesus Was A Capricorn (1972); Breakaway (1974) with Rita Coolidge; A Star Is Born (1976) with Barbra Streisand; Natural Act (1978) with Rita Coolidge; A Moment of Forever (1995); The Austin Sessions (1999); The Essential Kris Kristofferson (2004) 2CD; This Old Road (2006); Closer To The Bone (2009); Please Don't Tell Me How The Story Ends: The Publishing Demos 1968-72 (2010); Feeling Mortal (2012).

The French composer Albert Roussel (1869-1937) was ideally placed to develop a unique musical style. His background was more colourful than most of his fellow composers (he initially studied mathematics and worked as a naval officer before devoting himself to music), while his early years as a composer saw him exposed to a barrage of rich but conflicting musical influences: the impressionist movement (spearheaded by Debussy) and the more traditional approach of the Schola Cantorum (championed by d'Indy and Franck). Roussel absorbed the wide-ranging styles that he heard around him, blending and modifying them to establish his own distinctive voice – a voice that can be perceived clearly in his music for solo piano. Traditional musical forms are a frequent point of inspiration: in the Suite in F sharp Op.14, Roussel uses rustic dances as a basis to explore both counterpoint and tonal disintegration, while the Bach-inspired Prélude et Fugue demonstrates the neo-Classical style that he was drawn to in his later period. Above all, Roussel's piano music is characterised by its unique synthesis of rationality and feeling.