Q3 - Beginning in the 1950s, popular

[rmoncel]

Hi there,

Struggling through this question. No answer seems to be able to be inferred just from the info in the passage:

A. Incorrect. Relative information about the number of musicians per band does not allow us to infer anything about the absolute number of amateur musicians.

B. Incorrect. The passage contains no information about professional musicians' ability to play nonelectric instruments

C. Contender: but this does not seem to be necessarily true. Just because the overall number of musicians who play professionally has increased (in the passage) does not mean that there are more professional players per band. There could be more professional bands OVERALL and the same number of professional musicians or fewer PER BAND.

D. Contender: But if the number of professional musicians per band had increased, we could have a situation where the overall number of musicians who play professionally increased WHILE the overall number of band stayed the same or decreased.

E: I don't see how one can infer that from the passage.

Thanks for your help!

[giladedelman]

Thanks for the detailed post! I appreciate you going through your though process for each answer choice. Based on what you wrote, it seems that you've misread the stimulus in an important way.

We're told that the average number of musicians per band has decreased while the total number of professional musicians has increased. So there's no possibility, as you wrote, that the average band has increased in size -- we're told the exact opposite!

Now, if the average band is smaller, but there are more musicians overall, it must be true that there are more bands overall.

(D) is therefore the right answer: we can infer that the number of professional bands has increased.

(A) is totally out of scope. We aren't told anything about amateur musicians, only professionals.

(B) is also out of scope. We can't infer anything about their ability to play nonelectric instruments.

(C) is, like you said, possible -- maybe some individual bands have increased in size -- but we don't know it for certain.

(E) is out of scope. It would make sense if we were told, instead, that the number of bands has increased while the number of musicians has decreased or stayed the same.

Does that clear this one up for you?

[rmoncel]

Thanks Gilad. Your breakdown is useful. I got caught up in the distinction between "musicians" and "professional musicians" and thought it had implications for the answer choices.

[skapur777]

I have a serious problem with this...problem.

I got D right just because the others made no sense. But, how does it follow that professional bands have increased? What if the overall number of musicians who play popular music professionally are solo acts?

Doesn't, by definition, a band=more than one person?

So was 'The Jimi Hendrix Experience' a band or a solo act?

This question is rocking my world!!

[giladedelman]

Whoa, good point! So I take it back that it (D) must be true. But it's still the best answer, by far, because as you said, the other four are garbage. And that's our job! To pick the best answer. The most supported answer. Yes, maybe the difference is made up entirely of solo acts, but that doesn't seem super probable.

So, again, you're right: (D) is not perfect. But no need to stress out about it!

P.S. The Jimi Hendrix Experience consisted of Jimi on guitar, Mitch Mitchell on drums, and Noel Redding on bass. Definitely a band!

[skapur777]

ahahaha oh okay phewww! I knew the names of the members, I was just making sure poor Mitchell and Redding were getting their proper credit in LSAT world

glad to see a fellow LSAT-er enjoys great music.

[minhtientm249]

I,too, was confused because of the way this question defining the number of musicians in a band. Nevertheless, is there a better way to deal with this kind of question? When all of the answer choices seem wrong and the correct answer choice is kinda wrong? Because this question made me go through all the choices 3 times.

[ManhattanPrepLSAT1]

Nevertheless, is there a better way to deal with this kind of question? When all of the answer choices seem wrong and the correct answer choice is kinda wrong? Because this question made me go through all the choices 3 times.

First, this early in the section, go with your gut. If the overall number of musicians has increased and yet the average number of musicians per band has decreased, there's going to have to be a greater number of bands. Later in the section you be can picky, but early on, go with your instincts.

And second, make sure to distinguish the following two question stems:

1. Which one of the following must be true?

2. Which one of the following is most strongly supported by the statements above?

On the former, make sure the answer choice you select is absolutely proven beyond a shadow of a doubt. On the latter, give them some flexibility. The correct answer may not necessarily be true, but rather is strongly suggested from the information given.

Hope that helps!

[ffamran.ps]

I thought D was not supported at all. The stimulus only says that the average number of musicians per band has increased, not the average number of musicians per *professional* band. So it might be that the number of musicians per professional band has increased, and the average is pulled down by more numerous, shrinking amateur bands.

[SavannahH864]

I understand why D makes sense, but here is my thinking with answer A: If the number of professional musicians who play, would this not have decreased the number of amateurs in some capacity since those amateurs became professionals?
Also, how can we prove D? Could it be perhaps that there has simply been an increase in the number of solo-players who are professionals? I don't see why they had to join bands.
Savannah

[ohthatpatrick]

I think your logic for (A) is assuming that there's a steady number of musicians.

If there are 1000 musicians then
and 1000 musicians now,
then an increase in professionals would mean a decrease in amateurs.

But it's possible the entire pool has grown.

Maybe there were 1000 musicians before (500 pro / 500 amateur),
and nowadays there are 10,000 musicians (5,000 pro / 5,000 amateur).

If you think about what's happened over the past decade with the proliferation of easy to use home recording software like GarageBand, ProTools, Logic, etc. .... there are just way more people recording music (more amateurs AND more professionals)


For (D), you're right, it's not a bulletproof inference. However, the question stem doesn't require it to be a bulletproof inference; it has to just be very supportable.

(D) would only be wrong if we added some superfluous assumption that electrification led to lots of musicians who were formerly in bands to now be soloists.

It's definitely possible; it's just not a commonsense possibility.
(Can you think of a single example of a musician you know that was in a band previously but then began playing SOLO gigs with an electrified instrument?)

Maybe Ed Sheeran.

[JeremyK460]

Breakdown / List:
Beginning of the 50s came the electrification of musical instruments.

Electrification allowed musicians to play with increased volume.

Individual musicians having the ability to play with increased volume caused the average number of musicians per band to decrease.

Electrification increased the number of professional pop musicians.

Analysis:
Electrification played a role in the emergence of smaller but more total bands.

Answer Choices:
(A) There’s no telling of this complement class. This is the complement class of ‘professional musicians’ which is incompatible with drawing inductive inferences.

(B) I want to say this sounds like it could be true, but this answer presumptively enumerates a subject term and presumptively asserts a categorical relationship between ‘(most) professional musicians’ and having the quality of ‘being able to play both electric and non-electric instruments’.

(C) This could be true. From a contextual standpoint, the modification ‘professional’ that this answer decides to attribute to ‘musicians of a band’ feels redundant. Given the context of passage (musicians and bands within the popular music industry), a musician of this industry would inherently possess the specific difference of being ‘professional’. If this is the case, and all of these musicians are professionals, then this answer would be in contradiction with the idea that bands are now smaller (relative to the time period). I’m imagining a popular 50s ten-member jazz ensemble. They are a popular jazz ensemble playing their time’s pop music of their time; it’s reasonable to think that they are playing ‘pop music’ professionally. With the introduction of electrification, and the new sound of 60s and 70s, these bands consist of 4 members. I’m imagining a band like the Beatles; they play popular music professionally, all four members are professional musicians. So, to say that ‘there are more professional musicians in a band’ like this answer does, could be in opposition to the information provided by the stimulus.

Also, if I were looking at this in terms of proportion, I’d be forced to deduce information about the class of non-professional musicians; the stimulus doesn't provide the facts sufficient to support information about non-professional musicians. For instance, 8 of the 10 members in the 50s jazz-ensemble were non-professionals, and 1 of the 4 members of the Beatles is a non-professional (sorry, Ringo). This sounds nice, but information about nonprofessionals or Ringo Starr are not supported by the passage.

(D) This feels most supportable. The statements say…

Electrification caused bands to be smaller.
Electrification caused more musicians in total.

The statements tell me that bands were smaller in the 50s & 60s than they were in the 30s & 40s, yet there are more musicians in total in the 50s & 60s than there were in the 30s and 40s. Basically, bands have less musicians than before but there are more musicians in total than before. This means that it’s likely that the number of bands have increased.

(E) This is about the quantity of bands a musician plays for. The statements mention the ‘quantity of musicians’ in terms of their overall population, and the statements mention ‘quantity of band members’ in spite of whether musicians double dip or not. Also, the answer talks about ‘many P are doing X’ while the argument is about ‘many P are X’.

For (D), you're right, it's not a bulletproof inference. However, the question stem doesn't require it to be a bulletproof inference; it has to just be very supportable.

(D) would only be wrong if we added some superfluous assumption that electrification led to lots of musicians who were formerly in bands to now be soloists.

It's definitely possible; it's just not a commonsense possibility.
(Can you think of a single example of a musician you know that was in a band previously but then began playing SOLO gigs with an electrified instrument?)

Maybe Ed Sheeran.

Oh yes. There are too many examples of these sorts of situations!

Dave Grohl has left plenty of bands for his soloist tours and soloist albums (either acoustic or he plays/records all of the instruments).

Same goes for Morissey.

Frank Ocean left Odd Future to pursue a solo career, where his performances are very minimalistic; just him and a very high-tech keyboard that allows him to render his distinct sounds. He only plays with a band when a venue forces him too (for sound amplification purposes), which has only happened a few times, but nonetheless outside of his control.

Steve Aoki was in a band that he quit full time to pursue a career that consists of him standing behind a machine, alone, pushing buttons.

Sufjan Stevens left Marzuki and I just saw him live a couple years ago and his whole tour is him and a bunch of weird electronic instruments.

There are many, many more!