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

The musician, who contributed to and co-wrote Otis Redding's Sittin' On the Dock of the Bay and the hit track In the Midnight Hour, passed away recently in Music City, Nashville.

Considered among the finest backing bands in soul and R&B, the quartet the MGs was the core musical unit of the influential Memphis label Stax Records and is best remembered for their 1962 instrumental track Green Onions.

Cropper went on to join the comedy music group The Blues Brothers in the late 1970s and featured on their hit cover of Soul Man.

"Steve was a cherished guitarist, composer, and producer whose extraordinary talent touched countless people around the world," his family expressed in a release.

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

A cause of death was not immediately known.

A friend, Eddie Gore, recalled he was with Cropper on Tuesday in Nashville, where the guitarist had been working on new music.

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

An Illustrious Journey

Named the number two guitarist of all time by a British music magazine in 1996, Cropper began working at Stax Records in 1961 at the age of 20.

A year later, the MGs came together, featuring 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 thought of myself as a player who focuses on rhythm," Cropper remarked in a previous conversation. "I take pride in the fact that I can play something consistently, while other guitar players avoid that approach. They won't even play the same phrase 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 helped write Eddie Floyd's hit Knock on Wood.

According to available information, he was "a part of the majority of record put out by Stax from late 1961 through 1970".

"We would literally spend marathon sessions in the studio," Cropper noted in an interview. "I think we had nearly 20 artists on the roster, so we had a pretty busy schedule."