Steve Cropper, songwriter and guitarist in Booker T and the M.G.s, dead at 84

Steve Cropper, the lean, soulful guitarist and songwriter who helped anchor the celebrated Memphis backing band Booker T.and the M.G.’s at Stax Records and co-wrote the classics “Green Onions,” “(Sittin’ on) the Dock of the Bay” and “In the Midnight Hour,” has died.

He was 84.Pat Mitchell Worley, president and CEO of the Soulsville Foundation, said Cropper’s family told her that Cropper died on Wednesday in Nashville.The foundation operates the Stax Museum of American Soul Music in Memphis, located at the site of the former Stax Records, where Cropper worked for years.A cause of death was not immediately known.

Longtime associate Eddie Gore said he was with Cropper on Tuesday at a rehabilitation facility in Nashville, where Cropper had been after a recent fall.Cropper had been working on new music when Gore visited, he said.“He’s such a good human,” Gore said.

“We were blessed to have him, for sure.”The guitarist, songwriter and record producer was not known for flashy playing, but his spare, catchy licks and solid rhythm chops helped define Memphis soul music.At a time when it was common for white musicians to co-opt the work of Black artists and make more money from their songs, Cropper was that rare white artist willing to keep a lower profile and collaborate.Cropper’s very name was immortalized in the 1967 smash “Soul Man,” recorded by Sam & Dave.

Midway, singer Sam Moore calls out “Play it, Steve!” as Cropper pulls off a tight, ringing riff, a slide sound that Cropper used a Zippo lighter to create.The exchange was reenacted in the late 1970s when Cropper joined the John Belushi-Dan Aykroyd act “The Blues Brothers” and played on their hit cover of “Soul Man.”In a 2020 interview with The Associated Press, Cropper discussed his career and how he mastered the art of filling gaps with an essential lick or two.“I listen to the other musicians and the singer,” Cropper said.

“I’m not listening to just me....