Terse, taut and intrinsically bluesy — that was Steve Cropper’s guitar signature. He was an architect of 1960s Memphis soul who never wasted a note and rarely showed off. Cropper, who died Wednesday at 84, was a master of timing and spacing, of landing a few notes or a rhythm chord precisely where it would mean or imply the most, then letting silence and syncopation do the rest.
As a core member of Booker T. & the MG’s, the “Memphis Group” that backed up the soulful voices of the Stax-Volt Records roster throughout the 1960s, Cropper was a quintessential, self-effacing team player. When a song needed a rhythm chord or a pithy, twangy lick, he supplied it — then waited, like a cobra, to strike again. He also collaborated on words, music and production for a huge catalog of songs, including more than a few indelible soul anthems. Here are nine of his essential performances; there could be dozens more.
Booker T. & the MG’s, ‘Green Onions’ (1962)
On first listen, “Green Onions” might almost sound nonchalant. It’s a straightforward minor-key blues with a laconic melody, just a few notes from Booker T. Jones’s organ at each chord change. But listen again and Cropper makes it seethe all the way through, from his bitten-off chords in the intro to his taunting, jabbing solo and outro.
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Wilson Pickett, ‘In the Midnight Hour’ (1965)
Cropper wrote “In the Midnight Hour” with Wilson Pickett, who shouts his lusty vows over a bluntly assertive backbeat. Cropper’s guitar chords land squarely atop the snare drum, making that backbeat bristle.
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William Bell, ‘Share What You Got (But Keep What You Need)’ (1966)
On a song he wrote with William Bell and David Porter, Cropper’s raw, distorted guitar chords and winding countermelodies underline Bell’s ardent possessiveness: “I won’t share my baby,” Bell insists, with horns and a chorus affirming his monogamy.
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Eddie Floyd, ‘Knock on Wood’ (1966)
Written by Cropper and Eddie Floyd, “Knock on Wood” punches steadily all the way through, interrupted only by a door-knocking drum interjection. Cropper answers Floyd’s short phrases with brusque chords in a no-nonsense call-and-response, and horns add extra muscle.
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Sam & Dave, ‘Soul Man’ (1967)
The songwriter and producer Isaac Hayes told Cropper he needed an intro to a song he was finishing for a Sam & Dave session. Cropper listened to the chords, took out a Zippo cigarette lighter and used it to slide what became the opening guitar notes — and the lead-in to the outro — for “Soul Man.” He didn’t get songwriting credit, but he got a shout-out from Sam Moore, who calls out, “Play it, Steve!” halfway through.
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Otis Redding, ‘(Sittin’ on) the Dock of the Bay’ (1968)
Recorded in the months just before Otis Redding was killed in a plane crash on Dec. 10, 1967, “(Sittin’ on) the Dock of the Bay” would become his posthumous No. 1 hit. Cropper later told interviewers he had contributed lyrics hinting at Redding’s life — “I left my home in Georgia” — to a song that Redding had begun while staying on a houseboat in Sausalito, Calif. The sounds of waves lead into a subdued, undulating groove, and Cropper’s guitar stays countryish and understated behind the singer’s stoic desperation; Redding whistles a seemingly casual solo, but confesses, “This loneliness won’t leave me alone.”
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Booker T. and the MG’s, ‘Time Is Tight’ (1969)
The theme of “Time Is Tight” materializes in a slow intro, then kicks into gear, meshing Jones’s organ melody with Cropper’s patient vamp. The MG’s flaunt their compositional clarity and precise dynamics before the tune drifts away again.
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Steve Cropper, Pops Staples and Albert King, ‘Tupelo’ (1969)
A 1969 album, “Jammed Together,” convened three guitarists who had forged highly individual styles drawing on blues, country, gospel and jazz. With Albert King’s guitar on the left and Cropper’s on the right, Pops Staples sings “Tupelo,” a John Lee Hooker song about a dire flood in Mississippi. King takes the first solo, high and keening. Cropper follows with an earthy, hard-bitten reply, clawing its way forward, and joins a closing three-guitar tangle.
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Neil Young and Booker T. and the MG’s, ‘Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues’ (1993)
Booker T. and the MG’s regrouped as rockers to tour with Neil Young as his backup band in the early 1990s — including a spot at a 1992 Madison Square Garden concert tribute to Bob Dylan. In this fiery version of “Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues,” Cropper provides both stolid rhythm guitar and pointed little fills behind Young’s vocals before he takes his own unhurried, rangy, inexorably climbing solo.
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Jon Pareles has been The Times’s chief pop music critic since 1988. He studied music, played in rock, jazz and classical groups and was a college-radio disc jockey. He was previously an editor at Rolling Stone and The Village Voice.
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