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

The guitar virtuoso, who performed on and helped pen the classic song Sittin' On the Dock of the Bay and the hit track In the Midnight Hour, passed away on Wednesday in Music City, Nashville.

Considered among the greatest studio bands in soul music, the group Booker T & the MGs was the house band of the influential Memphis label Stax and is most famous for their 1962 track Green Onions.

Cropper went on to join the blues revival band The Blues Brothers in the 1970s and performed on their hit cover of Soul Man.

"Steve was a cherished musician, songwriter, and producer whose immense talent touched countless people around the world," his family said in a message.

"While we grieve 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 immediately known.

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

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

A Prolific Career

Named the second-best guitarist of all time by a UK publication in 1996, Cropper first found employment at Stax Records in 1961 at the age of 20.

A year later, the MGs were formed, featuring keyboardist Booker T Jones, drummer Al Jackson and bassist Lewie Steinberg - who was succeeded 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 guitarist," Cropper remarked in a past interview. "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."

Not only was he a guitarist, Cropper was a vastly creative 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 "integral to virtually every record released by Stax from 1961 through the end of 1970".

"We would often spend 15 hours a day in the studio," Cropper once recalled. "I think we had a roster of artists signed to the label, so we had a very hectic schedule."