I usually play my mp3 files through Banshee and they can play without skipping. Recently, I have installed VLC and hooked my sound up to a stereo. The reason I went with VLC is because of its ability to control the media player remotely (from a web browser). However, I have noticed that VLC is playing back choppy.
Are there other media players with this web interface that can playback better?
Also, I wouldn’t mind downloading a command line media player and writing my own CGI interface with the system. Are there any requirements to give system commands within a script to allow the media to play through the speakers? I suspect that if this CGI script runs as the user wwwrun, the audio won’t play through the speakers. Would I need to make the script or program run under a user that is logged in to openSUSE and has an active session?
Any suggestions are welcome 
Not sure if it does exactly as you require, I have no experience with what you doing, but Songbird does have a web interface and some have been singing it’s praises. it’s in the repo’s.
It doesn’t look like songbird has the web interface.
I really have no problems with Banshee (which comes with openSUSE-GNOME) other than the fact that it does not have the web interface.
I guess I’ll just have to make my own playlists and put songs that I don’t want to skip at all on it. It makes it a lot simpler at parties to be able to change the song on the computer/stereo upstairs from a device (I was envisioning phone or laptop) downstairs 
You can also try mpd (Music Player Daemon). In fact, it’s just a service running on the computer that plays music. You have to edit its configuration file in /etc/mpd.conf to tell where your music is located. You might also have to change the host/port it’s listening to so that you can connect to it from the network.
Once it’s started, you can pick a front-end to control it.
I personally use this Firefox Addon: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/6324
With it you can manage the playlist and see your music collection.
It’s also convenient as a firefox addon, because it’s also possible to install it on windows computers.
Pulse audio has also been know to cause choppy/skipping sound on some PCs. There are some workarounds which work for some users:
SDB:AudioTroubleshooting - openSUSE - choppy/skipping sound work around (for some)