In Brief

** 1/2 Mark Chesnutt, “What a Way to Live,” Decca. Some fine songs by the likes of Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings and Jim Lauderdale provide Chesnutt’s fourth album with a strong musical foundation. But too rarely do his vocals have the emotional range or subtlety to make even above-average numbers like these fully come to life.

New albums are rated on a scale of one star (poor), two stars (fair), three stars (good) and four stars (excellent).