After messing with it, the best I could get it was “not polished”. There is some screen flashing when it starts up and apparently there is no way to fade except in the video itself.
“C:\Program Files\VideoLAN\VLC\vlc.exe” “–qt-start-minimized” “–video-on-top” “–fullscreen” “K:\Videos\Sequence 01.mpg” “vlc://quit”
I suppose if that’s not a deal breaker it works fine as a rudimentary player that can be fired from inside Cantabile.
But for something polished I agree with oktogon that ShowCueSystem is probably the way to go. I saw that they have one month rental of their software for $20.