Thelonious Monk, who was a jazz pianist and composer, produced a body

Hello valepm,


You have presented your analysis with the right thought-process. So kudos for that.

Just adding my two cents. The sentence presents contrast evident by the usage of the word yet.

It is true that Choice C fails to present the intended contrast because there is no verb associated with the subject Thelonious Monk. So yes, Choice C has a missing verb for the subject.

Hope this helps.
Thanks.
Shraddha

Thelonious Monk, who was a jazz pianist and composer, produced a body of work both rooted in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith and Duke Ellington, yet in many ways he stood apart from the mainstream jazz repertory.

A. Thelonious Monk, who was a jazz pianist and composer, produced a body of work both rooted
B. Thelonious Monk, the jazz pianist and composer, produced a body of work that was rooted both
C. Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk, who produced a body of work rooted
D. Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk produced a body of work that was rooted
E. Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk produced a body of work rooted both

CHOICE A: There is nothing technically incorrect with the first 9 words of this sentence, but in general, you should prioritize ACTION VERBS such as "produced" and "stood apart" to VERBS OF BEING / LINKING VERBS such as "was," because verbs of being can often be skipped altogether. For example, "I liked the house that was blue" is unnecessary; instead one should say "I liked the blue house." In addition, "jazz pianist and composer" is Monk's title, and as such should be placed immediately next to his name if possible. For example, "Architect Frank Gehry..." is a better sentence opener than "Frank Gehry, the architect, ..." Finally, we should note that the word "both" does not work here, despite the fact that two musicians are mentioned at the end of the sentence. See the explanation of Choice E for more information on this.

CHOICE B: This is better than Choice A because the "who was" is removed, but it has the same problem as does Choice A with regard to the unnecessary separation between the person ("Monk") and his title ("jazz pianist and composer"), as well as the "both" issue explained in the analysis of Choice E.

CHOICE C: This cannot be correct, because the use of the modifier "who," which takes its own verb ("produced") and thus removes the main verb from the first part of the sentence. For example, "My friend, who owns a coffeeshop, yet he still finds time to practice the drums." is incorrect because of the ", who ____ ." In addition, there is no need to put a comma between the main subject of the sentence ("Monk") and its verb ("produced").

CHOICE D: Correct! It properly addresses both the flaws of the Choice A (unnecessary comma between the person and his title, unnecessary verb of being) and is the best choice here, though the "that was" at the end is unnecessary.

CHOICE E: This is a decoy answer that is very close to working (it does improve on Choice D in the omission of "that was"), but if you use the expression "(adjective) both in A and (in) B," then the first part of the expression needs to carry over to the second. It doesn't make sense to write "a body of work rooted both in the stride piano tradition of Willie Smith and Duke Ellington, yet..."--you can't be "rooted in Duke Ellington," because unlike the first example ("rooted in the stride piano tradition"), Duke Ellington is a person and not a musical style--this answer choice is incorrect. Thus, you could consider this to be a parallel structure error, or a faulty comparison.

For example (incorrect): "I am immersed in both the art of teaching math and English, yet I still have much to learn." Just because I wrote "math and English" doesn't mean that the "both" is correct. I am immersed in only one thing in this sentence--the art of teaching, whether or not that art consists of multiple elements (math and English). Hence I should remove the word "both" entirely, or put it before the word "math": "I am immersed in the art of teaching (both) math and English, yet I still have much to learn."

CORRECT VERSION: Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk produced a body of work that was rooted in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith and Duke Ellington, yet in many ways he stood apart from the mainstream jazz repertory.

PERFECT VERSION: Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk produced a body of work rooted in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith and Duke Ellington, yet in many ways he stood apart from the mainstream jazz repertory.

sayantanc2k

I have questions regarding (D) & (E).
It seems to me that "Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk" are two different people. 1.) Jazz pianist 2.) composer Thelonious Monk.

Can verbal experts help me clarify my confusion? To my understanding, it is X and Y. Each side of the word "and" is parallel to one another and represents different value.

The tricky thing about open parallelism markers such as “and” is that while we know that they connect the elements on either side, we don’t know how far those elements extend! In this case, “and” connects “Jazz pianist” and “composer” only. How can we tell? First, “Jazz pianist” can’t be someone’s name. At the very least, we’d need to say “*The* jazz pianist and *the* composer to show that we were talking about two different people, and even then, the reader would ask “Which jazz pianist?” Second, the rest of the sentence only refers to one singular subject: “he stood apart.”

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Isn't the correct answer choice incorrectly implying that the two persons, "Jazz pianist" and "composer Thelonious Monk" produced a body of work that was rooted....?

"Jazz pianist" and "composer" are both describing Thelonious Monk, not two separate people. If it helps, think about whether it would make sense to say "Jazz pianist... produced a body of work..." That's a mess, right? We could say "a jazz pianist produced a body of work" or "the jazz pianist produced a body of work" -- but either way, we'd need an article for "jazz pianist" to work properly as a noun in this context.

Since "jazz pianist" can't make sense as a noun in this sentence, it must be a modifier for "Thelonious Monk." And that makes perfect sense: why would we talk about a generic "jazz pianist", but then mention a specific composer (Thelonious Monk)? And it's completely reasonable for a musician to be both a pianist and a composer.

I hope this helps!

Hello Everyone!

Let's tackle this question, one issue at a time, and narrow it down to the right option quickly! To start, here is the original question with any major differences between the options highlighted in orange:

Thelonious Monk, who was a jazz pianist and composer, produced a body of work both rooted in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith and Duke Ellington, yet in many ways he stood apart from the mainstream jazz repertory.

(A) Thelonious Monk, who was a jazz pianist and composer, produced a body of work both rooted
(B) Thelonious Monk, the jazz pianist and composer, produced a body of work that was rooted both
(C) Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk, who produced a body of work rooted
(D) Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk produced a body of work that was rooted
(E) Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk produced a body of work rooted both

After a quick glance over our options, a couple things stand out that we can focus on:

1. How they begin: Thelonious Monk... / Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk...
2. both rooted / that was both rooted / rooted / that was rooted / rooted both

Let's start with #2 on our list because it deals with a pretty simple concept: to use the word "both" or not to use it! Whenever you see the word "both" in a sentence, make sure that it follows this format in some way:

both X and Y

It's also important to make sure X and Y are both parallel items, which is the key here to ruling out some confusing and just plain wrong answers. Let's focus on finding the X and Y in each sentence, and rule out any that aren't parallel. (I added the remainder of the sentence to help you see more clearly.)

(A) Thelonious Monk, who was a jazz pianist and composer, produced a body of work both rooted in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith and Duke Ellington, yet in many ways he stood apart from the mainstream jazz repertory. --> NOT PARALLEL

(B) Thelonious Monk, the jazz pianist and composer, produced a body of work that was rooted both in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith and Duke Ellington, yet in many ways he stood apart from the mainstream jazz repertory. --> NOT PARALLEL

(C) Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk, who produced a body of work rooted in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith and Duke Ellington, yet in many ways he stood apart from the mainstream jazz repertory. --> OK (doesn't use the word "both" at all)

(D) Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk produced a body of work that was rooted in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith and Duke Ellington, yet in many ways he stood apart from the mainstream jazz repertory. --> OK (doesn't use the word "both" at all)

(E) Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk produced a body of work rooted both in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith and Duke Ellington, yet in many ways he stood apart from the mainstream jazz repertory. --> NOT PARALLEL

We can eliminate options A, B, & E because they use the idiom "both X and Y," but the X and Y items aren't parallel. They all have X as "in the stride-piano tradition" and Y as "Duke Elllington," which are not parallel items at all!

Now that we have it narrowed down to only 2 options, let's take a closer look at #1 on our list: how to begin. To make problems easier to spot, I've included the rest of the sentence again:

(C) Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk, who produced a body of work rooted in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith and Duke Ellington, yet in many ways he stood apart from the mainstream jazz repertory.

This option is INCORRECT because it's missing a verb! By starting the next phrase with "...,who produced...," we've turned it into a non-essential clause or modifier! This means we have a SUBJECT + MODIFIER + SUBORDINATE CLAUSE, which isn't enough to make it a complete sentence.

(D) Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk produced a body of work that was rooted in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith and Duke Ellington, yet in many ways he stood apart from the mainstream jazz repertory.

This is CORRECT! It eliminated the use of "both," making it clear that the stride-piano tradition belongs to Willie Smith and Duke Ellington, which makes sense. It also puts the adjectives (jazz pianist and composer) next to the subject, Thelonious Monk, which also works. Oh, and it's a complete sentence with a clear subject (Thelonious Monk) and verb (produced).


There you have it - option D is the correct choice!


Don't study for the GMAT. Train for it.

Hi,

Isn't Option D supposed to have a comma after 'Jazz pianist and composer' as it describes Thelonious Monk.

Hi Ayushpandiya,

It depends on how important that information is. For example:

1. Prime Minister Boris Johnson claimed that... ← This is fine.

If we feel that the Prime Minister bit is not really important, we could introduce a comma, but then we'd have to add an article as well:
1a. A Prime Minister, Boris Johnson claimed that... ← Change in meaning.
1b. Prime Minister, Boris Johnson claimed that... ← This one is not correct.

Similarly, if we wanted a comma in the correct option, we'd have to go with a "A jazz pianist and composer, TM..." and not "Jazz pianist and composer, TM". However, the more important point here is that, like (1), option D is perfectly fine the way it is.

The reasoning is correct but a few corrections:

1) "who was a jazz pianist and composer" is a relative clause and not an appositive
2) "both" is wrong because the correlative conjunction then must be "both X and Y" (explained below)



Both can be used in the following ways:

Both Ram and Shyam played cricket.

Here, "both" is attaching itself to the nouns X = Ram and Y = Shyam. At the core, this is really the rule being tested.

Now, in this option, we have a word "both" that has to attach/apply itself to some nouns or noun phrases.

Both X=(rooted in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith)) and Y=(Duke Ellington)) --> X & Y don't match hence wrong

Rooted in both X=(the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith) and Y=(Duke Ellington) --> X & Y don't match hence wrong

Rooted in the stride-piano tradition of both X=(Willie (The Lion) Smith)) and Y=(Duke Ellington) --> X & Y match hence okay but redundant

In short - the word "both" doesn't make sense here. So we can take off the options which attempt to create that structure.

In general, correlative conjunctions are the easiest (if you know how) to eliminate - so ensure you understand the mechanics.



Okay so to understand this better, let me use an analogy:

Chairman and Managing Director, Mr.Mukesh Ambani produced a great result for his shareholders.

What is wrong with this sentence? Nothing!

So I think one thing we need to be very wary of is using rules that we are not sure about. Always use a bigger juicer grammatical reason to eliminate.

For example, C is a sentence fragment as there is no predicate for the subject Thelonious Monk.

Hope this helps,

Hey arun@crackverbal Thank You for the reply. Great explanation!

I have one last confusion that I want to resolve. (Hope it doesn't sound silly)

You used the example: Chairman and Managing Director, Mr.Mukesh Ambani produced a great result for his shareholders.

"Mr. Mukesh Ambani.....", modifies the preceding sentence which is very clear to me because it immediately follows "Chairman and Managing Director" after a "comma" which clearly takes the role of a modifier in this case.

However, the lack of comma in option D tripped me. If the option D were given as follows then I would have no confusion in understanding the meaning of the sentence:
Option D: Jazz pianist and composer, Thelonious Monk produced a body of work that was rooted

My question is, does the presence of a "comma" play any role in our case?

In general, on the GMAT you don't need to worry about the comma. I can pretty much assure you that the difference between the right and the wrong answer option will not be based on the presence (or absence) of a comma.

Having said so, there is no problem even if we have it as "Chairman and Managing Director Mukesh Ambani" or "Actor and Director Kamal Hassan". It just is telling the occupation.

The only case I can think of is in the case of a modifier (like an adjective):

Young and dashing, Rishabh Pant is playing right now.


But let me reiterate: there are plenty of things you need to worry about on the GMAT. This is not a rule you should worry about

D. Jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk produced a body of work that was rooted.

Shouldn't there be a comma after Jazz pianist and composer, Thelonious Monk.

Can anyone explain

hspruthi76 No, we don't want a comma. We'd use a comma if we started with an article ("a") and were using "A jazz pianist and composer" to set up or justify the action that follows:

A jazz pianist and composer, Thelonious Monk was able to play thousands of songs from memory.

To get a feel for the difference, take a look at these examples:

The governor of California, Gavin Newsom, gave a press conference today. (The comma creates an appositive--we're naming the governor.)
California governor Gavin Newsom gave a press conferene today. (Gavin Newsom is the subject, and the preceding modifier explains his role.)
New York chef Chloe Coscarelli is famous for her vegan cupcakes. (Chloe is the subject, and again the first part just explains who she is.)
The greatest guitar player of all time, Jimi Hendrix, died at age 27. (We can cut Jimi's name out and have a complete sentence, but we put his name in to explain who the greatest player is.)
A gifted physicist, my cousin was able to solve differential equations at age 6.
My gifted physicist cousin was able to solve differential equations at age 6.

GMATNinja Thank you for the explaination. I have seen a youtube video that has the question.

I need some clarity with regards to the correct answer choice. Option D starts off by " Jazz Pianist and composer Thelonius Monk" the first time I read the answer choices I though that these are 2 people as per choice D i.e the "Jazz Pianist" and "composer Thelonius Monk". I have seen questions where this kind of strcuture is correct and I thought this was not the intended meaning. And this was the only reason I eliminated C, D and E. And was figuring out the right answer between choices A and B.

I do understand why the rest of the answer choices are incorrect but I would like to know where is my understanding not correct.

Thank you.

Consider an example in which we really are discussing two different people:

• A jazz pianist and the composer Thelonious Monk produced a body of work.

Our subject consists of two individuals: 1) a jazz pianist and 2) the composer Thelonious Monk. Notice that if we were to rewrite the sentence without the second individual, it would still make perfect sense:

• A jazz pianist produced a body of work.

Now, if you're wondering whether (D), in fact, refers to two individuals, you could try the same game and drop the 'second' individual to see if it makes sense:

• Jazz pianist produced a body of work.

That's no good. We need the article "a" if we are talking about a single jazz pianist by himself/herself. Similarly, we would say, "A GMAT tutor can be helpful." instead of "GMAT tutor can be helpful."

Because there's no article in (D), we know that "jazz pianist" describes Thelonious Monk instead of referring to some other person.

I hope that helps!

Isn't (D), also showing that there are 2 subjects "Jazz pianist" and "Thelonious Monk"?