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

The artist, who performed on and co-wrote Otis Redding's Sittin' On the Dock of the Bay and the hit track In the Midnight Hour, succumbed this past Wednesday in Nashville.

Considered among the finest studio bands in the history of soul music, the quartet Booker T. Jones and the MGs was the resident studio band of the historic Memphis label Stax Records and is best remembered for their classic 1962 track Green Onions.

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

"Steve was a beloved guitarist, composer, and producer whose immense talent inspired generations around the world," his family said in a release.

"While we mourn the loss of a family man and friend, we are consoled knowing that Steve will endure through his music," they noted.

A cause of death was not released at this time.

A colleague, Eddie Gore, mentioned 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 said. "We were lucky to have him, for sure."

An Illustrious Journey

Ranked the number two guitarist of all time by a British music magazine 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 entered 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 past interview. "I get off on 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 vastly creative songwriter, and besides Dock of the Bay and In the Midnight Hour, he helped write Eddie Floyd's hit Knock on Wood.

According to his official biography, he was "involved in the majority of record released by Stax from late 1961 through the end of 1970".

"We would literally spend 15 hours a day in the studio," Cropper said. "I think we had nearly 20 artists we worked with, so we had a extremely demanding schedule."