If you thought old-style phonographic recordings had gone the way of the dodo you are in for a surprise

Far removed from the ring roads and grand avenues that punctuate Beijing are its historic alleys, and in these you can stumble over well-hidden shopping gems.

Until a year ago one of these was a tiny shop called Free Sound, in the downtown area, which prided itself as an independent purveyor of vinyl records and other musical recordings.

Sixteen years ago the owner, Wang Zhuohui, quit his job in the hospitality industry and opened the shop, which specialized in domestic and international indie singer-songwriters of various styles.

The Beijing native says seeing people in the shop, no matter whether they were looking for something in particular or simply browsing, was a delight.

“I think people liked spending time there. It was a space where you could discover music, and I got to tell some of the customers about my ideas on music.”

Wang, in his mid-40s, was introduced to music by his parents, who played vinyl records at home. One of his favorite singersongwriters is the Chinese rock musician Cui Jian, and like many music lovers of his generation, Wang enjoyed going to record shops. It was in these that he spent much of his money, he says.

However, just as CDs all but killed off vinyl and cassettes as mediums for music, online streaming brought on by the internet revolution has virtually put paid to the traditional record shop.

Between 2002 and 2005 in particular, the fall in sales of CDs and other types of musical recordings in China was precipitous, mostly as the result of piracy and online streaming, and the customer base for record shops evaporated as people stopped buying physical records.

Over 15 years Free Sound sold about 300,000 records but last year Wang realized that his number was finally up, and the shop closed its doors for good.

The day that happened, in May, turned into something of a wake as many of the shop’s cli- entele called in to pay their last respects, taking a few records with them, and leaving flowers behind.

“It’s a memory many people share,” Wang says.

However, any sense of despair these music lovers may have felt that day can be buried for this month Wang will open a new shop called

Free Sound not that far from its predecessor.

Located in an alley called Bingjiaokou

Hutong, it will be bigger than the earlier version, offering space for shoppers and indie singersongwriters to chat.

In fact, Wang says, this resurrection was largely preordained; it was an idea he had considered even before the doors of the first shop closed. For his loyal customers the good news means they and others will have the chance to enjoy the old yet classic way of listening to music.

“It started out as a dream for me and I feel so fortunate to have lived out that dream,” Wang says.

April 21 marked Record

Store Day, an annual international event that few people other than the most dyed-in-the-wool audiophiles will be familiar with. The industry uses the day to promote independent record shops that continue to support the industry as they battle tough times.

The idea of a special day was that of an employee of the Bull Moose music store in the United States.

Two weeks after the

2018 Record Store Day, an event called Blue Union

Vinyl Market, which attracted local record stores’ owners, including

Wang, was held at Blue

Note Beijing, the first branch of New York’s famous Blue Note Jazz Club in China.

The event’s co-initiator Shi Jing says many young music lovers turned up to buy CDs and vinyls, which was a big surprise.

“Their interests are many and varied, from jazz, soul, hip-hop to rock. They embrace the traditional music culture. It’s great to see that people are paying for music. It’s possible for record stores to survive and thrive here.”

One buyer of physical records is Zhang Yuanyuan, 24, a music lover in Suzhou, Jiangsu province.

Zhang says she loves the Taiwan pop singer Jay Chou and has bought all of Chou’s CDs and vinyls since she was at high school. She also follows her idol’s tours and buys the most expensive tickets.

“Only loyal fans buy physical records nowadays to add to their personal collection. It’s a special connection between me as a fan and Chou. I also pay for online streaming and downloading. But compared with physical records, listening to music on my phone or computer is just pure entertainment.”

The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry said in a recent report that revenue from physical formats fell 5.4 percent last year, compared with a fall of 4.4 percent in 2016. Consumption of physical formats fell in most markets, but revenue for physical recordings still accounted for 30 percent of the global market and a higher percentage of market share in countries such as Japan (72 percent) and Germany (43 percent). Globally, revenue from vinyl sales grew 22.3 percent and accounted for 3.7 percent of the total recorded music market last year.

“We are optimistic about the physical records market in China though it will take some time to recapture the glory years of the 1990s,” says Hou Jun, vice-president of China Record Group Co Ltd, the biggest and oldest record company in the country.

“Many people are happy to listen to music on their smartphones and assume record stores can barely survive, but in fact the country, which used to be home to many local record companies and record stores catering to every taste and budget, is enjoying a revival, especially with the resurgence of vinyl.”

In the 1990s the company sold about 10 million records, such as pop, folk, and classical music by Chinese singers and orchestras, Hou says. In the early 2000s the number dropped to no more than 10,000 copies, and the huge change in the way music was consumed led to many Chinese record companies closing down in the first 10 years of the millennium.

However, it now appears that some of those changes were not necessarily permanent. In the late 1990s China Record Group Co Ltd closed down its last vinyl production line because of the decline of the market of physical records. Several weeks ago, as the company celebrated the 110th year of its founding, it announced plans to revive vinyl production.

Fan Guobin, president of China Record Group Co Ltd, says the company has imported a production line from Germany that marks the start of the company’s vinyl production, and the company has set up a vinyl records factory in Shanghai that has a complete production line.

“The completion of the factory shows that China’s vinyl record production, which originated in Shanghai in the 1920s, is ready to take off again in the same city,” Hou says.