Melodic sequence

A sequence is a kind of motivic variation.

The technique is simple: repeat the idea while retaining the rhythms and interval sizes but change the pitch level. The interval qualities may change.

When the interval qualities are kept, the melody may no longer be diatonic. This is called an exact sequence. Thus, an inexact sequence is when the qualities are changed to be diatonic.

This is also called a transposition.

belkin-2018 (p.5 par.4) considers it to be a “close form” variation.