iTunes music pauses unexpectedly on Windows

When I'm playing a music playlist using iTunes on my laptop, sometimes the music suddenly stops playing, as if some ghost hit the space bar ('pause'). When I manually hit the space bar, the music starts playing again where it left off.

I use an HP laptop with Windows 11. The same thing occurred with my last laptop, also an HP with Windows 11, and a previous version of iTunes. It happens when I'm using my laptop as a music player with no other activity.

Any ideas as to what's causing this, and how to fix?