🔗 Share this article

Steve Cropper, the celebrated guitarist with Booker T and the MGs, has passed away at the age of 84.

The musician, who contributed to and co-wrote the classic song Sittin' On the Dock of the Bay and the hit track In the Midnight Hour, succumbed on Wednesday in the city of Nashville.

Often cited among the best backing bands in soul and R&B, the quartet Booker T. Jones and the MGs was the core musical unit of the historic Memphis label Stax Records and is most famous for their 1962 instrumental track Green Onions.

Cropper went on to join the blues revival band The Blues Brothers in the 1970s and featured on their popular rendition of Soul Man.

"Steve was a deeply admired guitarist, composer, and producer whose immense talent impacted countless people around the world," his family said in a release.

"While we grieve the loss of a husband, father, and friend, we find comfort knowing that Steve will live forever through his music," they noted.

A specific cause was not immediately known.

An associate, Eddie Gore, recalled he was with Cropper recently in Nashville, where the guitarist was in the process of creating new music.

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

A Storied Musical Path

Named the second-best guitarist of all time by a British music magazine in 1996, Cropper started his career at Stax Records in 1961 at the age of 20.

A year later, the MGs were formed, comprising keyboardist Booker T Jones, drummer Al Jackson and bassist Lewie Steinberg - who was succeeded 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 rhythm guitarist," Cropper remarked in a previous conversation. "I get off on the fact that I can play something repeatedly, while other guitar players wouldn't consider it. They are reluctant to repeat the same riff twice."

As well as a guitarist, Cropper was a productive songwriter, and in addition to Dock of the Bay and In the Midnight Hour, he co-wrote Eddie Floyd's hit Knock on Wood.

According to available information, he was "involved in the majority of record released by Stax from 1961 through year end 1970".

"We would often spend 15 hours a day in the studio," Cropper once recalled. "I think we had a roster of artists on the roster, so we had a pretty busy schedule."