Mavis Staples "We Get By" (feat. Ben Harper)
About The Artist
Grim days call for fierce love. And Mavis Staples, one of the most enduring figures in American music, is laying it down. Sad And Beautiful World is the latest solo album from a national treasure and multigenerational talent. On her new record, Mavis stands side by side with us in the face of dangers she knows all too well, at a time when more and more people have reason to wonder who and what could be lost.
Sad And Beautiful World was produced by Brad Cook, known for his work with Bon Iver, Waxahatchee, and Nathaniel Rateliff, among other artists. The record spans seven decades of the American songbook — a range nearly as vast as Mavis’ career — and includes reinventions of timeless songs as well as original music.
Now 86, Mavis has been performing since the age of eight. After starting out with her father Roebuck “Pops” Staples, sisters Cleotha and Yvonne, and brother Pervis in the Staple Singers more than seventy years ago, she’s the lone surviving member of the group, still carrying her family’s gifts and knowledge with her as a living heritage.
Inducted into several halls of fame (blues, rock, and gospel), a Kennedy Center Honoree, a winner of multiple GRAMMYs (including a Lifetime Achievement Award), Mavis is our musical history. She’s collaborated with nearly every major figure of her era(s), from Bob Dylan to Prince, Aretha Franklin, and Willie Nelson — not to mention countless stars from subsequent generations.
“Didn’t it rain, children / Talk ’bout rain, oh, my Lord,” Staples began, channeling Mahalia Jackson and Sister Rosetta Tharpe as Helm gleefully joined in. “Didn’t it, didn’t it, didn’t it oh my Lord / Didn’t it rain?”
“We both cried,” recalls Staples. “We hadn’t seen each other in years, and it was just such an emotional moment. How could we help but sing?”
