Bluegrass musician Bill Monroe, whose repertory

[RonPurewal]

compare:

Your car is bigger than my car.
Your car is bigger than mine.
(identical sentences)

The resale value of your car is greater than the resale value of my car.
The resale value of your car is greater than the resale value of mine.
The resale value of your car is greater than that of my car.
The resale value of your car is greater than that of mine.
(all identical)

there you go. the analogy should be clear.

[kedieez967]

A:
- "That included" can't follow a comma, and, even if you remove the comma, the meaning is absurd (the implication would be that Elvis and Jerry composed part of the anatomy of many different musicians).

hi, Ron, sorry for bumping the thread.

there is a confusion. If i change "that" into "who" in choice A, whether the "who included....." part expresses the intended meaning, which is that Elvis and Jerry belongs the category, generations of bluegrass artists.

Beside, whether there is some difference between "who including" and "including" in meaning as in this case?

wait for clarification. Many thanks.

[tim]

It is unclear what help you are looking for here. Can you please type a grammatically correct question so we can help you?

[RonPurewal]

read this:
https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/foru ... ml#p115313

[RonPurewal]

once you've read that ^^ you should understand why 'who included' doesn't make sense—we're not talking about people's body parts. (:

(remember, 'comma + including' is a modifier THAT EXISTS SPECIFICALLY TO CONVEY the idea of 'i'm naming some, but not all, members of a group'. if that's the intended meaning, then use it!)

[kedieez967]

If i change "that" into "who" in choice A, whether the "who included....." expresses the correct meaning, which is that Elvis and Jerry belongs the category, generations of bluegrass artists?

beside, could you explain the difference between "who include" and "include"?

Thank you very much!

Best wishes!

[kedieez967]

i got it! your examples do a great favor on the problem.

After i have read tons of your posts on SC, i can get the meaning of a sentence more easily. and gradually i fall in love with English.

Thank you very much!

[tim]

This is good to hear. I assume you're telling us you figured out your previous question. If you still have any questions, be sure to post them so we can help you.

[HemantR606]

I eliminate choice because "that include" cannot modifies musicians, i.e. musicians are humans whereas "that" can only refer to things or animals.

Is my interpretation correct?

Thank you.

Yes. Nicely done.

Hi Ron,

Sorry for being so vague, but I have once seen your forum post saying that 'that' can modify people as well. You have also cited an OG example which has a 'that' that modifies a person or people.

I don't remember the exact post. So, I cannot provide the link.

I am confused. Please help.

Thanks a lot.

[HemantR606]

A:
- "Influential on" is bad idiomatic usage.
- "That included" can't follow a comma, and, even if you remove the comma, the meaning is absurd (the implication would be that Elvis and Jerry composed part of the anatomy of many different musicians).

C:
- "Was influential to" is at best awkward.
- See A for discussion of "that included."
- "Significantly" should come before "different."
- "In comparison to" is redundant because the sentence already says "different."

D:
- See above for "influential to."
- The wording of this choice implies that bluegrass artists aren't musicians (skeleton sentence: "BM, whose stuff influenced lots of bluegrass artists, also inspired many musicians.")
- "The music of whom" is wordy ("whose music" is better).
- "Differed when compared to" is redundant - and it's an incorrect interpretation (literally, it means that the music was only 'different' when someone was actively comparing it to some other music).

E:
- "That of his own" is redundant (and incorrect, because it literally means "Bill Monroe's music's music").

[edit: I had originally posted incorrect information about subject-verb agreement on choice E. The correct verb is 'was'.]

Hi Ron,

Apart from the doubt I have posted above, I didn't understand the red words in the quote.

Isn't the word 'was' enough to eliminate the options 'C' and 'D'? I did not find anything related to 'was-were' break in the issues you have listed.

Moreover, I did not understand the blue part in the quote. As far as I can observe, all the options contain that structure.

Please explain.


Thanks a lot.

[RonPurewal]

--- NOTHING IN THIS POST WILL EVER BE NECESSARY ON THIS EXAM ---

here's how to understand the blue comment:

• the correct sentence is
... inspired many musicians, including Elvis Presley and Jerry Garcia, whose music differed significantly from his own

in other words, the main part of the correct sentence is ... inspired many musicians whose music differed significantly from his own.
this makes sense.
(other bluegrass artists' music was like monroe's. so, 'musicians whose music differed...' is a DIFFERENT group of people. therefore 'also' is logical.)

--

choice D, on the other hand, cannot be read this way. (Many musicians the music of whom... is not a legitimate construction.)

the only way to read choice D is
...inspired many musicians(, who included Elvis Presley and Jerry Garcia(, the music of whom differed significantly...))

hence this sentence implies that bluegrass artists and 'musicians' are separate groups of people.

--

...but, again, the most important thing i can tell you is
--- NOTHING IN THIS POST WILL EVER BE NECESSARY ON THIS EXAM ---
(there are MUCH easier ways to get through this problem... and EVERY other problem. you will never have to think with anywhere near this degree of subtlety.)

[RonPurewal]

Isn't the word 'was' enough to eliminate the options 'C' and 'D'? I did not find anything related to 'was-were' break in the issues you have listed.

the original poster mentioned this ^^

[RonPurewal]

in any case, here are the things i see as 'closest to the ground' here:

subject-verb issues:
'x, y, and z was...'
(kill C and D)

obvious differences in wordiness/efficiency:
'influenced' is clearly better than 'was influential...'
'inspired' is clearly better than 'was an inspiration' / 'was inspirational'
(this ALONE can eliminate ALL the wrong answers!!)

redundancy
('differed' + 'compared'/'comparison')
(kill C and D)

'that' for people
(kill A and E)

pronoun 'that of' stands for nothing
(...since 'his own' already means music)
(kill E)


that's plenty of reasons, none of which has any degree of subtlety or nuance.

[KunalK958]

in any case, here are the things i see as 'closest to the ground' here:

subject-verb issues:
'x, y, and z was...'
(kill C and D)

obvious differences in wordiness/efficiency:
'influenced' is clearly better than 'was influential...'
'inspired' is clearly better than 'was an inspiration' / 'was inspirational'
(this ALONE can eliminate ALL the wrong answers!!)

redundancy
('differed' + 'compared'/'comparison')
(kill C and D)

'that' for people
(kill A and E)

pronoun 'that of' stands for nothing
(...since 'his own' already means music)
(kill E)


that's plenty of reasons, none of which has any degree of subtlety or nuance.

Amazing how you have compiled the reasons in such a manner, I wish i had concise reasoning like the above for the other questions as well.

[LarryM989]

Bluegross musician Bill Monroe, whose repertory, views on musical collaboration, and vocal style were influential on generations of bluegrass artists, was also an inspiration to many musicians, that included Elvis Presley and Jerry Garcia, whose music differed significantly from his own.

(A) Same
(B) influenced generations of bluegrass artists, also inspired many musicians, including Elvis Presley and Jerry Garcia, whose music differed significantly from
(C) was influential to generations of bluegrass artists, was also inspirational to many musicians, that included Elvis Presley and Jerry Garcia, whose music was different significantly in comparision to
(D) was influencial to generations of bluegrass artists, also inspired many musicians, who included Elvis Presley and Jerry Garcia, the music of whom differed significantly when compared to
(E) were an influence on generations of bluegrass artists, was also an inspiration to many musicians, including Elvis Presley and Jerry Garcia, whose music was significantly different from that of

Instructors - I see was/were, beyond that please help!!

I have a doubt regarding the above question. While the answer explanations provided by both Ron and Stacy are lucid and clear, the usage of the possessive pronoun "whose music differed " looks a little ambiguous for me . It is not close to the antecedent "musicians" and seems to refer "Elvis Presley and Jerry Garcia". But none of the answer options have a better option and hence B seems good. Is there a better way to frame the sentence or is it not necessary for the pronoun to be close to the noun it is trying to modify in the case of " comma whose". While answering the question i kinda recalled the use of the relative pronoun "comma which " in the other GMAT questions where the relative pronoun is almost always preceded by the noun it is trying to modify . Please clarify