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aleatory music

(Encyclopedia)aleatory music āˈlēətôrˌē [key] [Lat. alea=dice game], music in which elements traditionally determined by the composer are determined either by a process of random selection chosen by the comp...

Percier, Charles

(Encyclopedia)Percier, Charles shärl pĕrsyāˈ [key], 1764–1838, French architect. He won (1786) the Grand Prix de Rome, and in 1794 he became associated with Pierre François Léonard Fontaine. Napoleon appoin...

piezoelectric effect

(Encyclopedia)piezoelectric effect pīēˌzōĭlĕkˈtrĭk [key], voltage produced between surfaces of a solid dielectric (nonconducting substance) when a mechanical stress is applied to it. A small current may be ...

Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra

(Encyclopedia)Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, founded 1888, one of the world's foremost orchestras. It performs at the Royal Concertbegouw [concert building], Amsterdam, Netherlands, designed by Adolf Leonard van Ge...

Turner, John Napier Wyndham

(Encyclopedia)Turner, John Napier Wyndham, 1929–2020, Canadian prime minister (1984). Born in England, he immigrated (1932) to Ontario with his Canadian-born mother after she was widowed. Trained as a lawyer, he ...

theorem

(Encyclopedia)theorem, in mathematics and logic, statement in words or symbols that can be established by means of deductive logic; it differs from an axiom in that a proof is required for its acceptance. A lemma i...

Vergennes, Charles Gravier, comte de

(Encyclopedia)Vergennes, Charles Gravier, comte de shärl grävyāˈ kôNt də vĕrzhĕnˈ [key], 1717–87, French statesman. After serving as ambassador at Trier, Constantinople, and Stockholm (where in 1772 he p...

Arthur I

(Encyclopedia)Arthur I, 1187–1203?, duke of Brittany (1196–1203?), son of Geoffrey, fourth son of Henry II of England and Constance, heiress of Brittany. Arthur, a posthumous child, was proclaimed duke in 1196,...

Mathews, Max Vernon

(Encyclopedia)Mathews, Max Vernon, 1926–2011, American engineer known as the father of computer music, b. Columbus, Nebr., grad. California Institute of Technology (B.S., 1950), Massachusetts Institute of Technol...

Cronin, James Watson

(Encyclopedia)Cronin, James Watson, 1931–2016, American nuclear physicist, b. Chicago, Ph.D. Univ. of Chicago, 1955. Cronin and co-researcher Val Logsdon Fitch were awarded the 1980 Nobel Prize in Physics for a 1...