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

Hello jim441,

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To answer your query, for "Jazz Pianist" to even ambiguously refer to a separate person, it would need to be preceded by an article such as "a" or "the"; as the sentence is structured, "Jazz pianist" and "composer" are clearly modifiers acting upon "Thelonious Monk".

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Experts' Global Team

Hello TheUltimateWinner,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, your edited version of B is correct, though a bit awkward.

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All the best!
Experts' Global Team

Hi TheUltimateWinner,

The question doesn't test this issue, but I don't agree with ExpertsGlobal5 here.


If we use a comma, we absolutely need an article in this case (we can't say Jazz pianist and composer, Thelonious Monk produced a body of work). It'd be good to see more opinions on this though.

Short answer: no commas!

Longer answer: As AjiteshArun has shown, it's very normal to put a modifier directly before someone's name (without a comma) to indicate what the person is known for. In many cases, this involves more than one modifier joined with AND: "actress and singer Doris Day." We might even have a list of modifiers, in which case we would have commas. Here's a quote from NPR's recent obituary of the great Harry Belafonte. (Notice that NPR doesn't use the Oxford Comma, so we only see a comma after the first item.) "Singer, actor and human rights activist Harry Belafonte died Tuesday at age 96 of congestive heart failure."

It's important to realize that in none of these cases do we have any ambiguity. We are only talking about one person! This is typically true in real-world sentences, and it is even more true on the GMAT. Since SC questions always present ONE stand-alone sentence with no other context, we'll never see a sentence that just mentions some random, unnamed pianist before moving on to talk about a named person. That provides no clarity for the reader, so any interpretation based on the idea that this would occur should be thrown out. From there, we can know with certainty that "Jazz pianist and composer" are two modifiers for Thelonious Monk. (And what a great pianist and composer he was!)

TheUltimateWinner

It's very normal to see things that CAN be verbs appear as modifiers. I'm sure you see this all the time! For instance, we might say "I stopped to talk with a professor considered by many to be the foremost authority on Mesopotamian pottery." How can we tell that "considered" is a modifier, and specifically an adjective modifying "professor"? First, it makes sense that the professor IS CONSIDERED an expert, rather than that the professor WAS CONSIDERING some other expert. The latter would be a strange and confusing thing to say. Second, a verb wouldn't work structurally here. Before "considered," we have a subject, a verb, and an object. We can't just tack on another verb. If we WERE writing about a professor WHO CONSIDERED someone else, we'd need to start a modifier before introducing a verb: "I met a professor WHO CONSIDERED Yoko Ono to be the greatest composer of all time."

Looking back at the original example, we can see that the same things are going on. First, nothing is ROOTING anything. Neither Monk nor the body of work ROOTED anything. In fact, no one can root a body of work in a tradition. To say that the work WAS ROOTED in a tradition just means that it HAS ITS ROOTS in that tradition. It's like saying a day was "filled with happiness." That doesn't mean someone actually filled the day with happiness. It's just describing the day. Second, if the work DID root something, we'd need a bridging modifier: "He created a body of work WHICH ROOTED." As it stands, all 5 choices say that the work was rooted, either by attaching ROOTED directly to WORK (A/C/E) or by saying "work that was rooted" (B/D). So in all the answers, ROOTED describes the body of work. That makes it an adjective.

TheUltimateWinner

These are interesting questions you're answering, but I think it's important not to ignore the underlying content of the sentence. The sentence is about one person: Thelonious Monk. Whatever we say in the modifier, that doesn't change that he is the singular subject of the sentence.

We could actually do what you're saying if the "the composer" portion was used to introduce a modifier: "A jazz pianist and the composer of such classics as 'Round Midnight and Ruby, My Dear, Thelonious Monk produced . . . "

Both parts of that initial modifier still describe Monk, who is one person. I could imagine having a compound modifier that applies to two people in the subject, but it would be a little weird: "A pianist and a saxophone player, Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane produced . . . " I don't think the GMAT would do that, because it isn't terribly clear. We'd at least need "respectively" after "player" to indicate that the modifiers were meant to refer to the two subjects in turn, but it would be more elegant to apply them directly where they belong: "Thelonious Monk, a pianist, and John Coltrane, a saxophone player," or "Pianist Thelonious Monk and saxophonist John Coltrane."

Hi Experts GMATNinja mikemcgarry

GMAT Qs are a bit funny sometimes, except that they cost a lot!!
Do we not actually need a BOTH after verb-ed modifier - rooted?
None of sentences have below format:
Thelonious Monk, who was a jazz pianist and composer, produced a body of work
rooted both in the stride-piano tradition of Willie (The Lion) Smith and in Duke
Ellington, yet in many ways he stood apart from the mainstream jazz repertory.
But this too sound incorrect too me.

OA simply eliminates usage of
BOTH if BOTH in not used in correct idiom as : BOTH x and y (x and y: noun phrases)
Any views on the same?
WR, Arpit

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.

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....?

Hi,

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

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?

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.

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