Ok. Update for anyone else looking for a solution to this same thang. This is the one I’ve come up with:
I found a vst file player made by Mirax labs. Seems to be solid so far, simple and does what I want. It’s here, it costs a tenner. vstPlayer – Mirax Labs
I’ve set it up in its own rackspace, running into a mixer plugin and then out to my outputs. I can set the playlist going, then just shift to my gig rackspace and the sound will fade out naturally, fade defined by the audio tail length. Nice!
I’ve added a button widget controlling the play/pause function and another controlling the next track function. With both of those activated in my rackspace, when I return to the rackspace at the end of a set, the playlist will automatically skip to the next track and then start playing. Also have a slider widget set up to control the mixer volume so that I can moderate incidental music volume to suit the venue.