Mr. Neill uses melodic and rhythmic cells that are Baroque in origin.

It thus goes beyond Mr. Riley's "In C," which gives the players a lot of freedom but provides them with melodic cells.

But that theme, in the clarinet line, was soon transformed into a sequence of minimalist rhythmic and melodic cells, toying with the expectations created in the movement's opening section.

The basic elements of Minimalism - tonality, rhythmic regularity, repetition of brief melodic cells - are reasonably easy to summarize.

The revised sheet music contains a number of rhythmic, harmonic and melodic cells from the original version, and the slow movement is largely unaltered.

Moreover, Stravinsky's use of melodic cells that constantly expand and contract also stemmed from peasant practice.

Much of "Violet Fire" is based on tiny melodic and rhythmic cells repeated at length.

Although the tracks start with unlikely sounds, they tend to shift into competent, mild-mannered routines, repeating their melodic cells a few times too often.

Over and over again, Tchaikovsky makes his pieces something much more than a mere salon diversion by forming his tunes out of small, constantly changing and evolving melodic cells.

But the most striking aspect is the degree to which short melodic cells cohere into a rich, expansive fabric.