India, March 24 -- The way people listen to music has evolved very rapidly. Although the gramophone was before my time, I grew up on the record player and then the tape recorder before the CD and then non-physical media formats arrived, all this in the matter of a few decades. Cassettes are not yet a very distant memory, having been around until at least the 1990s, but I am not sure how many people under the age of 40 or so have ever seen a record player in operation.

The music is recorded on a circular disc of vinyl plastic, with its surface covered with microscopic grooves that spiral inwards towards the centre. As the disc rotates, the music plays when a needle (stylus) comes into contact with these grooves and moves inwards. The need...