By the time she was 13, Mavis Staples was practically a music biz veteran. She was already touring hard with her father, Roebuck (known as Pops), and siblings Cleotha, Pervis and Yvonne as the Staple Singers. During the ’50s and ’60s, they sang gospel, and in the ’70s, they turned up the funk, scoring No. 1s with “I’ll Take You There” and “Let’s Do It Again.”
Now 76, Staples, who released a new album, “Livin’ on a High Note” (produced by M. Ward), earlier this month, and still tours, is the subject of an HBO documentary, “Mavis!,” premiering Monday. In her long career, she’s met a lot of interesting people. Here, she tells The Post her most treasured memories.
Martin Luther King Jr.
As the Staple Singers became involved in the civil rights movement, they found they had a fan in King, who was especially fond of “Why (Am I Treated So Bad).”
“The last time I saw Dr. King was in Chicago around 1966,” Staples remembers. “He called Pops and said he wanted to meet at a restaurant. Pops took my mother, sister and myself with him. He said he wanted us to know that he was bringing Jesse Jackson to Chicago to start Operation Breadbasket — a local weekly food drive. Nobody knew Jackson yet, but Dr. King said, ‘Staples, if you and your girls sing there, people will come out and bring food to put in the baskets.’ And they did!”
Sam Cooke
The original soul man grew up in Chicago, close to the Staples family.
“Sam was part of a gospel group called the Highway QC’s, and my older brother Pervis also had a group,” the singer says. “They would battle sometimes. There was one church that would let them come in after service was over. The only people that would be in the church would be us children. We would eat chips, drink Coca-Cola and listen to them sing, just for us!”
Prince
It’s frequently forgotten that Staples recorded two albums with Prince — 1989’s “Time Waits for No One” and 1993’s “The Voice.”
“Oh, Lord, working with Prince was beautiful, but I had to stop because daylight kept catching me up,” she says. “We’d stay up all night singing and I would leave Paisley Park in the morning.
“One day, I asked him when he sleeps. He said, ‘Mavis, sleeping is a waste of time.’ I said, ‘OK, well I’m going to waste some time — I’ll see you later!’ ” she says, laughing. “I took him to be my son. I told him he was going to have two mothers. I still e-mail him from time to time and say ‘Hello, son!’”
Bob Dylan
The young Dylan was a huge Staple Singers fan and when they crossed paths during the early ’60s folk explosion, he even proposed marriage to Mavis.
“He was a handsome guy. I used to play on his curly hair. We had a little thing called puppy love,” Staples gushes. “We were too young, but I often wonder what would have happened if we had married. We would have us some kids by now and they’d probably be in a supergroup!”