A music sequencer is a tool that allows you to program and playback sequences of notes, rhythms, and effects automatically instead of performing or recording each part in real-time. Sequencers don’t generate their own sounds. Rather, they send MIDI and CV information to trigger other instruments or effect parameters.

You play some notes (the sequencer is listening), it records everything that you are playing, and spits it back out just like you played it. The best sequencer you have available to you is almost certainly your DAW. The techniques and methodology gets a lot more complicated from there but this is the basic idea — it's like a note recorder.

When it comes to recording audio digitally, a sequencer is an electronic device developed for collecting various types of sequences (chords, musical notes, or rhythms). Those sound sequences can be transferred to and played back on either an electronic musical instrument, a Musical Instrument Digital Interface instrument, or sound module.

Assistant Editor Tom Flint replies: A sequencer in its most basic form is a memory bank which stores note information as MIDI data. It's a bit like a multitrack recorder, in that it is usually used to record music as tracks, except that a multitrack recorder will record audio rather than MIDI data.