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Steve Cropper, the renowned guitarist with the iconic band Booker T & the MGs, has passed away at the age of 84.

The guitar virtuoso, who performed on and helped pen Otis Redding's Sittin' On the Dock of the Bay and Wilson Pickett's In the Midnight Hour, succumbed this past Wednesday in the city of Nashville.

Often cited among the finest supporting groups in soul and R&B, the quartet the MGs was the house band of the influential Memphis label Stax and is primarily known for their classic 1962 track Green Onions.

Cropper later became a member of the comedy music group The Blues Brothers in the late '70s and featured on their popular rendition of Soul Man.

"Steve was a cherished musician, songwriter, and producer whose extraordinary talent inspired countless people around the world," his family expressed in a statement.

"While we grieve the loss of a loved one and companion, we are consoled knowing that Steve will be remembered through his music," they added.

A specific cause was not immediately known.

A friend, Eddie Gore, stated he was with Cropper just the day before in Nashville, where the guitarist was in the process of creating new songs.

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

An Illustrious Journey

Voted the runner-up for guitarist of all time by a British music magazine in 1996, Cropper first found employment at the Stax label in 1961 at the age of 20.

A year later, the MGs came together, 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 honored by inclusion in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992.

"I've always thought of myself as a rhythm player," Cropper said in a previous conversation. "I get off on the fact that I can play something consistently, while other guitar players avoid that approach. They refuse to play the same lick twice."

In addition to being a guitarist, Cropper was a prolific 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 "a part of nearly all record issued by Stax from 1961 through year end 1970".

"We would often spend marathon sessions in the studio," Cropper noted in an interview. "I think we had 17 or 18 artists signed to the label, so we had a extremely demanding schedule."