🔗 Share this article The iconic guitarist Steve Cropper, guitarist of Booker T and the MGs, has died aged 84 Steve Cropper served as a key member of the house band of the seminal Memphis label Stax Records. Steve Cropper, the acclaimed guitarist with the iconic band Booker T & the MGs, has left us at the age of 84. The artist, who played on and collaborated on writing Otis Redding's Sittin' On the Dock of the Bay and Wilson Pickett's In the Midnight Hour, passed away this past Wednesday in Nashville. Often cited among the greatest backing bands in soul and R&B, the quartet Booker T & the MGs was the resident studio band of the groundbreaking Memphis label Stax and is primarily known for their classic 1962 track Green Onions. Cropper also joined the John Belushi-Dan Aykroyd act The Blues Brothers in the late 1970s and featured on their hit cover of Soul Man. "Steve was a deeply admired musician, songwriter, and producer whose extraordinary talent touched millions of lives around the world," his family expressed in a message. "While we feel sorrow for the loss of a loved one and companion, we take solace knowing that Steve will be remembered through his music," they added. A reason for his passing was not immediately known. A friend, Eddie Gore, stated he was with Cropper recently in Nashville, where the guitarist was developing new songs. "He's such a wonderful human," Gore said. "We were lucky to have him, for sure." Steve Cropper, right, with artists Eddie Floyd and Sheryl Crow. An Illustrious Journey Ranked the runner-up for guitarist of all time by a music periodical in 1996, Cropper first found employment at the Stax label in 1961 at the age of 20. A year later, the MGs were founded, consisting of keyboardist Booker T Jones, drummer Al Jackson and bassist Lewie Steinberg - who was succeeded by Donald "Duck" Dunn in 1964. The band was entered into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992. "I've always seen myself as a rhythm player," Cropper said in a previous conversation. "I get off on the fact that I can play something repeatedly, while other guitar players avoid that approach. They are reluctant to repeat the same lick twice." Not only was he a guitarist, Cropper was a vastly creative songwriter, and alongside Dock of the Bay and In the Midnight Hour, he co-wrote Eddie Floyd's hit Knock on Wood. According to his official biography, he was "integral to virtually every record put out by Stax from the fall of 1961 through year end 1970". "We would often spend long days in the studio," Cropper noted in an interview. "I think we had a roster of artists we worked with, so we had a pretty busy schedule."