R&B legend Frankie Beverly, founder and longtime leader of the soul institution Maze, has died. In a social-media statement, Beverly’s family shared the news that he passed away yesterday. No cause of death has been reported. Beverly was 77.

Frankie Beverly was born Howard Stanley Beverly in Philadelphia, and he started out singing in church as a child. As a teenager in the ’60s, Beverly founded a pair of doo-wop groups, the Blenders and the Butlers. Frankie Beverly And The Butlers eventually worked with Philly soul legend Kenny Gamble, and their 1967 single “If That’s What You Wanted” became a cult favorite on the UK’s Northern soul scene.

Frankie Beverly And The Butlers eventually morphed into a group called Raw Soul, which moved from Philadelphia to San Francisco in the early ’70s. There, Marvin Gaye recruited Raw Soul as an opening act and convinced Beverly to change the band’s name to Maze. The newly rechristened Maze — often billed as Frankie Beverly & Maze, or Maze Featuring Frankie Beverly — continued on for decades as a perennial favorite in Black America. Maze toured as Marvin Gaye’s warm-up act for a while in the mid-’70s, and that led to a deal with Capitol. They released their debut album Maze Featuring Frankie Beverly in 1977. It went gold, and so did eight other Maze LPs.

Maze’s sound was a lush, ebullient take on soul-funk, and it struck an immediate chord. The group’s debut single “While I’m Alone” reached #89 on the Hot 100, but it did much better on the R&B chart, which would become a regular thing for the group. In a 17-year chart run, Maze released a grand total of four Hot 100 hits, none of which made it to the chart’s upper half, but they were staples on R&B radio. The group’s silky sound never crossed over to white pop audiences, but they became something like the Black Grateful Dead, and their live shows were always tremendous community events. Beverly, joyously growling in all-white designer sweats, was a pure all-star at events like Essence Fest.

The lineup of Maze shifted over the years, but the basic sound did not. Maze’s records almost always went gold but never platinum, and the group carried the flame for smooth and celebratory R&B. Tracks like “Before I Let Go” and “Joy And Pain” became beloved touchpoints. Beyoncé released a “Before I Let Go” cover in 2019, and artists like 2Pac, 50 Cent, and Daft Punk have made heavy use of Maze samples. The band’s 1985 single “Back In Stride” reached #1 on the R&B chart, and they returned to that spot with 1989’s “Can’t Get Over You.”

Maze were still racking up R&B hits as recently as 1993, when they released Back To Basics, their final studio LP. That one went gold, too. Maze continued to tour heavily after they finished their recording career, and they played the San Jose Jazz Summer Fest just last month. Beverly always seemed ageless, and his loss comes as a real sad surprise. Below, check out some of his work.