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Steve Cropper, the celebrated guitarist with the seminal soul group Booker T & the MGs, has left us at the age of 84.

The guitar virtuoso, who played on and helped pen Otis Redding's Sittin' On the Dock of the Bay and the hit track In the Midnight Hour, died on Wednesday in Music City, Nashville.

Often cited among the finest studio bands in soul and R&B, the four-piece band the MGs was the house band of the influential Memphis label Stax and is most famous for their 1962 instrumental track Green Onions.

Cropper also joined the John Belushi-Dan Aykroyd act The Blues Brothers in the late 1970s and played on their hit cover of Soul Man.

"Steve was a beloved artist, writer, and producer whose extraordinary talent touched millions of lives around the world," his family said in a message.

"While we feel sorrow for the loss of a family man and friend, we are consoled knowing that Steve will live forever through his music," they continued.

A reason for his passing was not immediately known.

A friend, Eddie Gore, recalled he was with Cropper on Tuesday in Nashville, where the guitarist was in the process of creating new music.

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

A Prolific Career

Named the number two guitarist of all time by a music periodical in 1996, Cropper first found employment at the Stax label in 1961 at the age of 20.

A year later, the MGs came together, comprising keyboardist Booker T Jones, drummer Al Jackson and bassist Lewie Steinberg - who was succeeded by Donald "Duck" Dunn in 1964.

The band was entered into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992.

"I've always considered myself to be a rhythm guitarist," Cropper remarked in a past interview. "I get off on the fact that I can play something repeatedly, while other guitar players wouldn't consider it. They won't even 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 "involved in nearly all record issued by Stax from late 1961 through the end of 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 very hectic schedule."