🔗 Share this article

Steve Cropper, the celebrated guitarist with the iconic band Booker T & the MGs, has left us at the age of 84.

The musician, who played on and helped pen Otis Redding's Sittin' On the Dock of the Bay and Wilson Pickett's In the Midnight Hour, succumbed on Wednesday in Nashville.

Widely regarded among the greatest backing bands in soul music, the four-piece band the MGs was the resident studio band of the groundbreaking Memphis label Stax Records and is primarily known for their classic 1962 track Green Onions.

Cropper later became a member of the John Belushi-Dan Aykroyd act The Blues Brothers in the 1970s and played on their successful version of Soul Man.

"Steve was a beloved musician, songwriter, and producer whose extraordinary talent touched countless people around the world," his family stated in a statement.

"While we grieve the loss of a loved one and companion, we find comfort knowing that Steve will endure through his music," they noted.

A cause of death was not released at this time.

An associate, Eddie Gore, recalled he was with Cropper just the day before in Nashville, where the guitarist was in the process of creating fresh material.

"He's such a good human," Gore remarked. "We were fortunate to have him, for sure."

A Storied Musical Path

Voted the runner-up for guitarist of all time by a UK publication in 1996, Cropper started his career at Stax in 1961 at the age of 20.

A year later, the MGs were formed, consisting of keyboardist Booker T Jones, drummer Al Jackson and bassist Lewie Steinberg - who was replaced by Donald "Duck" Dunn in 1964.

The band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992.

"I've always seen myself as a player who focuses on rhythm," Cropper explained in a previous conversation. "I take pride in the fact that I can play something consistently, while other guitar players wouldn't consider it. They won't even play the same riff twice."

Not only was he a guitarist, Cropper was a productive songwriter, and in addition to Dock of the Bay and In the Midnight Hour, he helped write Eddie Floyd's hit Knock on Wood.

According to historical accounts, he was "involved in virtually every record released by Stax from late 1961 through year end 1970".

"We would truly spend long days in the studio," Cropper noted in an interview. "I think we had a roster of artists on the roster, so we had a pretty busy schedule."