The lost art of sharing sounds

Before the Walkman, we had to listen to other people's music. Now, our tastes are ever narrowing

- Charmain Naidoo

I catch up to things late, always have done. I went, by way of example, from my transistor radio and those finickity cassettes that needed cumbersome cassette recorders to the smartphone with its ability to play music. I skipped over that breakthrough era of the Walkman and evaded the time of the Discman and the portable CD player.

I even missed out on MP3 players. I still shake my head: what was I thinking? Why did I never acquaint myself with the latest technology and get myself a device that would have allowed me to hear music inside my head through those spindly, non-earpod but serviceable headphones?

Probably the most important thing about the Walkman was that it revolutionised how we listened to music, changing the consumption of music - and all things auditory, such as audiobooks and podcasts. How? By giving us the chance to have a private listening experience, laying down the pathway for individual listening choice.

It was a heady breakaway from the "before" listening times, and took away the constant carping and complaining about whose turn it was. My teen years were hell, an endless negotiation around the inexplicable (to a truculent pre-adult) concept of sharing.

I grew up in a family of six, all with particular musical tastes, all needing airtime. My mother liked classical music with religious themes: hymns, Gregorian chants, Handel's Easter music; the Ave Marias (both Bach and Schubert versions). "Cross yourself music", my brothers called it, mostly because my God-fearing mother often made the sign of the cross when she heard a particularly stirring liturgical piece.

My father liked Elvis Presley, Nat King Cole, Buddy Holly, Frank Sinatra, Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald... played loudly (which annoyed my mother) so he could hear it while he cooked.