Clint Holmes’ mother, Audrey, dies at 95

When Clint Holmes was a Harrah's Las Vegas headliner, he welcomed the nightly chance to be upstaged by his mother, Audrey, who stole the show when he handed her the mic to sing an operatic snippet of George Gershwin's "Summertime."

Audrey Holmes died Wednesday in Las Vegas at age 95. "So many of you knew our mom, she was blessed with a long life, never boring, often challenging, often thrilling," Holmes wrote on his Facebook page.

Holmes, in New York to perform at the Cafe Carlyle, said there would be a memorial service "in a couple of weeks."

Audrey Holmes took her spotlight moment most evenings when health permitted during Holmes' run at Harrah's from 2000 to 2006. But his parents' story also inspired much of his original songwriting.

In his nightclub act, Holmes would introduce the song "America Was Waiting" by telling his audience: "My mother is a white British opera singer. My dad was a black American jazz singer. Which makes me ... Puerto Rican."

She was born in Kenilworth, Warwickshire, on Nov. 21, 1915. During World War II, she entertained U.S. soldiers at USO functions and met Ed Holmes at a USO hall during his military service in England. Their biracial marriage and subsequent struggles to be accepted in Buffalo, N.Y., all figure prominently in the two autobiographical musicals Clint Holmes based on his life: "Comfortable Shoes" and "Just Another Man."

As a vocal music teacher in Buffalo, she taught young singers and supported fledgling performers such as Frank Scinta, who with his brother and sister would go on to headline in Las Vegas as members of The Scintas.

"I've known her since I was 9 years old," Frank Scinta said Thursday. "She was everything Clint talked about in the show."

Her husband preceded her in death, and she followed her son to Las Vegas once he became an established headliner. In 2007, she was 91 when she saw him and daughter Gayle Steele portray themselves in "Just Another Man" on the University of Nevada, Las Vegas campus.

"I am so fortunate and proud of them," she said. "To think that Clint can write the way he writes, they're not just ordinary words. ... I've never been able to tell him that."

Contact reporter Mike Weatherford at mweatherford@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0288.