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pitch, in music

(Encyclopedia)pitch, in music, the position of a tone in the musical scale, today designated by a letter name and determined by the frequency of vibration of the source of the tone. Pitch is an attribute of every m...

Debussy, Claude Achille

(Encyclopedia)Debussy, Claude Achille klôd äshēlˈ dəbüsēˈ [key], 1862–1918, French composer, exponent of musical impressionism. He studied for 11 years at the Paris Conservatory, receiving its Grand Prix ...

kelvin

(Encyclopedia)kelvin, abbr. K, official name in the International System of Units (SI) for the degree of temperature as measured on the Kelvin temperature scale. ...

Ritchie, Alexander Hay

(Encyclopedia)Ritchie, Alexander Hay, 1822–95, American engraver and painter, b. Scotland. He came to the United States in 1841 and a few years later established a successful workshop in New York City. His engrav...

machine translation

(Encyclopedia)machine translation, in computational linguistics, publishing, and other fields, the use of computers to conduct large-scale translation operations. The electronic translation of one language into ano...

Greek fire

(Encyclopedia)Greek fire, a flammable composition believed to have consisted of sulfur, naphtha, and quicklime. Although known in antiquity, it was first employed on a large scale by the Byzantines. Bronze tubes th...

bugle

(Encyclopedia)bugle, brass wind musical instrument consisting of a conical tube coiled once upon itself, capable of producing five or six harmonics. It is usually in G or B flat. Its principal use is for military a...

balance

(Encyclopedia)balance, instrument used in laboratories and pharmacies to measure the mass or weight of a body. A balance functions by measuring the force of gravity that the earth exerts on an object, i.e., its wei...

absolute pitch

(Encyclopedia)absolute pitch, the position of a tone in the musical scale determined according to its number of vibrations per second, irrespective of other tones. The term also denotes the capacity to identify any...

standard of living

(Encyclopedia)standard of living, level of consumption that an individual, group, or nation has achieved. The evaluation of a standard of living is relative, depending upon the judgment of the observer as to what c...