In an apparatus for reproducing digitized signals recorded in successive, substantially circular tracks on a rotated disc by means of a pickup of the optical type which, in a normal scanning state, scans the tracks in succession; a first or prepare-to-play command signal causes the pickup to reproduce the digitized signals for a predetermined interval corresponding to more than one of the tracks on the disc starting from a desired position on such one track and the digitized signals reproduced in that predetermined interval are stored, desirably in a random access memory (RAM), whereupon a standby state of the pickup is established in which the pickup traces a closed loop on the rotated disc within a range corresponding to the previously mentioned predetermined interval. Upon reception of a second or play command signal, the pickup is released from its standby state at the completion of the tracing of the closed loop during which the play command signal occurred and the normal scanning state of the pickup is reestablished. Further, in response to the second or play command signal, the stored digitized signals are read out from the RAM and transmitted, starting with the signals corresponding to the desired position irrespective of the rotational position of the disc at the time of the play command signal, and the digitized signals reproduced by the pickup on the reestablishment of its normal scanning state and, more particularly, commencing with the digitized signals following the predetermined interval, are sequentially stored in the RAM and then sequentially read out and transmitted therefrom.