David Bianculli

The number one R&B hits he helped write included Otis Redding's Sittin' on the Dock of the Bay, Eddie Floyd's Knock on Wood, and Wilson Pickett's In the Midnight Hour.

Steve Cropper was 14 when he bought his first guitar and developed his style by listening to both country and rhythm and blues guitarists.

In 1962, when Cropper was doing an instrumental jam at Stax Records with organist Booker T. Jones and his band, the engineer hit record.

The resulting record, Green Onions, was a major hit.

Steve Cropper appeared in the 1980 movie The Blues Brothers playing guitar and playing himself as Steve the Colonel Cropper.

In 1992, Booker T and the MGs were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Two years before that, Steve Cropper spoke with Terry Gross.

She asked him if the music in Memphis played a big part in his life when he was growing up there.

Steve Cropper spoke with Terry Gross in 1990.

He died Wednesday at age 84.

After a break, Kevin Whitehead will celebrate the 100th birthday of jazz organist Jimmy Smith, even though the celebration may be a few years early.

Also, we note the passing of playwright Tom Stoppard, who died last week at age 88.

And critic-at-large John Powers reviews the new Brazilian film The Secret Agent.

I'm David Bianculli, and this is Fresh Air.

Reference books give the birth date of the great jazz organist Jimmy Smith as December 8, 1925, 100 years ago.

More recent sources cite 1928 as Smith's birth year.

Our jazz historian Kevin Whitehead says at this point the latter date looks more plausible.

That'd make Monday Jimmy Smith's 97th birthday, not his 100th.

But just to be on the safe side, Kevin Whitehead offers this tribute.

Kevin Whitehead is the author of New Dutch Swing, Why Jazz and Play the Way You Feel.