🔗 Share this article Legendary guitarist Steve Cropper, guitarist of the famed band Booker T & the MGs, dies aged 84 Steve Cropper served as a key member of the resident musical group of the seminal Memphis label Stax Records. Steve Cropper, the acclaimed guitarist with Booker T and the MGs, has left us at the age of 84. The guitar virtuoso, who played on and collaborated on writing Otis Redding's Sittin' On the Dock of the Bay and the hit track In the Midnight Hour, succumbed recently in the city of Nashville. Considered among the best supporting groups in the history of soul music, the four-piece band Booker T & the MGs was the resident studio band of the historic Memphis label Stax/Volt and is best remembered for their classic 1962 track Green Onions. Cropper later became a member of the comedy music group The Blues Brothers in the late 1970s and featured on their hit cover of Soul Man. "Steve was a cherished musician, songwriter, and producer whose extraordinary talent inspired millions of lives around the world," his family stated in a statement. "While we feel sorrow for the loss of a family man and friend, we find comfort knowing that Steve will live forever through his music," they added. A specific cause was not disclosed. A friend, Eddie Gore, stated he was with Cropper recently in Nashville, where the guitarist was in the process of creating fresh material. "He's such a wonderful human," Gore remarked. "We were blessed to have him, for sure." Steve Cropper, right, with peers Sheryl Crow and Eddie Floyd. A Storied Musical Path Named the runner-up for guitarist of all time by a UK publication in 1996, Cropper began working at the Stax label in 1961 at the age of 20. A year later, the MGs came together, featuring organist 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 rhythm player," Cropper said in a past interview. "I take pride in the fact that I can play something consistently, while other guitar players don't want to even know about that. They refuse to play the same riff twice." As well as a guitarist, Cropper was a prolific songwriter, and besides Dock of the Bay and In the Midnight Hour, he collaborated on Eddie Floyd's hit Knock on Wood. According to his official biography, he was "integral to the majority of record put out by Stax from the fall of 1961 through year end 1970". "We would truly spend 15 hours a day in the studio," Cropper noted in an interview. "I think we had 17 or 18 artists signed to the label, so we had a pretty busy schedule."