Sittin’ on the Dock of the Bay is the posthumous hit single that brought Otis Redding to the attention of the public and making his name synonymous with the soul music of the 1970’s. Otis Redding was born on September 9th 1941 in Dawson, Georgia where his early singing career saw him adding his deep soulful tones to the choir of the Vineville Baptist Church in Macon Georgia where his family lived after Otis was five years old.

After winning a local talent show for 15 weeks non stop Otis became well known in his community as a celebrity and a voice to be reckoned with.

It was 1960 that saw Otis’s career really taking off when he won his first recording contract and released She's All Right and Shout Bamalama with this group under the name Otis and The Shooters. He followed these recordings up with These Arms of Mine, a ballad that Redding had written himself in 1962.

Between 1964 and 1966 Otis had hits with Try a Little Tenderness, I Cant get no Satisfaction, written by Mick Jagger and Respect which later became a smash hit for Aretha Franklin.

For most of the 1960’s Otis sang mainly his own compositions.

On December 10^th 1967, Otis and six members of his back up group, The Bar-Kays met an untimely end when the plane they were traveling in crashed into lake Monona in Wisconsin. Only one member of the group, Ben Cauley survived the crash.

The cause of the plane crash was never determined and Redding’s body was dragged from the freezing winter waters of the lake the next day. Otis was just 26 years old at the time of his death and had yet to hit the big time as a singer and musician.

But the fame was not to allude him, as in death his song, Sittin in the Dock of the Bay became a huge hit on both sides of the Atlantic. The song, which he recorded three days prior to his death went straight to number one and became his first million dollar selling record

In 1999, Redding posthumously received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

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