ReWire is a

software Software is a set of computer programs and associated software documentation, documentation and data (computing), data. This is in contrast to Computer hardware, hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. ...

protocol, jointly developed by

Propellerhead Reason Studios (formerly known as Propellerhead Software) is a music software company, based in Stockholm, Sweden, and founded in 1994. It produces the studio emulation Reason. History Propellerhead Software was founded in 1994 by Ernst N ...

and

Steinberg Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH (trading as Steinberg) is a German musical software and hardware company based in Hamburg. It develops music writing, recording, arranging, and editing software, most notably Cubase, Nuendo, and Dorico. It als ...

, allowing remote control and data transfer among digital audio editing and related software. Originally appearing in the ReBirth

software synthesizer A software synthesizer or softsynth is a computer program that generates digital audio, usually for music. Computer software that can create sounds or music is not new, but advances in processing speed now allow softsynths to accomplish the sa ...

in 1998, the protocol has since evolved into an industry standard. Reason Studios has announced that they will discontinue the Rewire protocol at the end of 2020. Currently used in

macOS macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac (computer), Mac computers. Within the market of ...

and Microsoft Windows 32-bit or 64-bit audio applications, ReWire enables the simultaneous transfer of up to 256 audio tracks of arbitrary resolution and 4080 channels of

MIDI MIDI (; Musical Instrument Digital Interface) is a technical standard that describes a communications protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, computers, an ...

data. This allows, for example, the output from synthesizer software to be fed directly into a linear editor without the use of intermediate files or analog transfers. There are also provisions to remotely trigger actions, such as starting and stopping recording. The protocol is licensed free of charge to companies only, but comes with a "non-disclosure of source code" license that is incompatible with most free-software licenses. The ReWire system consists of "Hosts", "Panels", and "Devices". Hosts are the host applications which typically do the sequencing at one end and the final mixdown at the other end. A Device is a

dynamic link library Dynamic-link library (DLL) is Microsoft's implementation of the shared library concept in the Microsoft Windows and OS/2 operating systems. These libraries usually have the file extension DLL, OCX (for libraries containing ActiveX control ...

that only generates sound; it has no user interface. A Panel is a graphical interface for setting the parameters of one Device. A typical setup would be to use Ableton Live in "Host" mode, and use Propellerhead Reason as a synthesizer. In this case Reason would provide Device/Panel pairs to Ableton, which could then send MIDI commands, sync timing and mix Reason's output into its own effects chains. Many applications support either mode. In fact, an application could (at the discretion of a developer) act as both a Host and a Panel at the same time.

ReWire Hosts ("Sequencers/Trackers")

* Ableton Live * Adobe Audition *

Cakewalk Sonar Sonar was a digital audio workstation created by the former Boston, Massachusetts-based music production software company Cakewalk. It was acquired by Singaporean music company BandLab Technologies and renamed Cakewalk by BandLab. Notable fe ...

/ Cakewalk by BandLab{{cite web, url= https://reverb.com/news/bandlab-acquires-cakewalk-assets-from-gibson , title=BandLab Acquires Cakewalk Assets from Gibson , website=Reverb, date=2018-02-23 , accessdate=2020-11-05 * Cycling '74 Max/MSP *

FL Studio FL Studio (previously known as FruityLoops before 2003) is a digital audio workstation (DAW) developed by the Belgian company Image-Line. FL Studio features a graphical user interface with a pattern-based music sequencer. The program is avail ...

* GarageBand * Jeskola Buzz (with plugin.) * Logic Pro * MOTU Digital Performer * MU.LAB * Notion * Plogue Bidule *

Pro Tools Pro Tools is a digital audio workstation (DAW) developed and released by Avid Technology (formerly Digidesign) for Microsoft Windows and macOS. It is used for music creation and production, sound for picture ( sound design, audio post-prod ...

REAPER A reaper is a farm implement or person that reaps (cuts and often also gathers) crops at harvest when they are ripe. Usually the crop involved is a cereal grass. The first documented reaping machines were Gallic reapers that were used in Rom ...

* Renoise * Samplitude * Sonoma Wire Works RiffWorks * Sony ACID Pro *

Steinberg Cubase Cubase is a digital audio workstation (DAW) developed by Steinberg for music and MIDI recording, arranging and editing. The first version, which was originally only a MIDI sequencer and ran on the Atari ST computer, was released in 1989. Cut-d ...

Steinberg Nuendo Nuendo is a digital audio workstation (DAW) developed by Steinberg for music recording, arranging, editing and post-production. The package is aimed at audio and video post-production market segments (marketed as an 'Advanced Audio Post-Productio ...

Studio One Studio One or Studio 1 may refer to: * Studio One (software), digital audio workstation software, developed by PreSonus * ''Studio One'' (American TV series), a 1948–1958 American television anthology series * ''Studio One'' (Emirati TV progra ...

* Synapse Audio Orion Platinum *

Tracktion Tracktion (now known as Waveform) is a digital audio workstation for recording and editing audio and MIDI. The software is cross-platform, that runs on Apple macOS, Microsoft Windows, and Linux. History Tracktion was developed by independent UK ...

* Zynewave Podium

ReWire Devices ("Synthesizers")

* Ableton Live * Arturia Storm *

Cakewalk The cakewalk was a dance developed from the "prize walks" (dance contests with a cake awarded as the prize) held in the mid-19th century, generally at get-togethers on Black slave plantations before and after emancipation in the Southern Unit ...

Project 5 * Cycling '74 Max/MSP *

Finale Finale may refer to: Pieces of music * Finale (music), the last movement of a piece * ''Finale'' (album), a 1977 album by Loggins and Messina * "Finale B", a 1996 song from the rock opera ''Rent'' * "Finale", a song by Anthrax from ''State of Eu ...

(beginning in v.25) *

* Plogue Bidule *

* ReBirth RB-338 *

Record A record, recording or records may refer to: An item or collection of data Computing * Record (computer science), a data structure ** Record, or row (database), a set of fields in a database related to one entity ** Boot sector or boot record, ...

* Renoise * Sibelius (beginning in v.6) * Sony ACID Pro *

Vocaloid is a singing voice synthesizer software product. Its signal processing part was developed through a joint research project led by Kenmochi Hideki at the Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona, Spain, in 2000 and was not originally intended to b ...

* Vocaloid 2

External links

Propellerheads' description of ReWireA database of tutorials on how to rewire different combinations of rewire compatible software programs.Reason Studios announcement of discontinuing the product
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References

Music software plugin architectures

ReWire Hosts ("Sequencers/Trackers")

ReWire Devices ("Synthesizers")

See also

External links