I read the article and spent the next couple of days integrating Java and Applescript together with iTunes. You see, I have a rackmount linux server with no sound card. However, it has an X10 cm11 unit being monitored with a program called ppowerd. ppowerd can listen to X10 remote control input and execute actions based on which signals it receives. Rather than spending actual money on a sound card for the linux box, I thought, "why not make a java program on the mac which will take output from ppowerd and play music when the X10 remote control buttons are pressed". I have 8 buttons relating to different playlists.

You may think this is a very "Rube Goldberg" approach, but it works. The interface is a very simple TCP command interface, but I can make it speak arbitrary text, play playlists, etc.

If anyone is interested, let me know and I can post the ppowerd configuration/perl scripts/java code/Makefile, etc.