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, confirmed Cropper's death to CBS News. 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 told The Associated Press 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

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