Sad News: Jim Caruso's Mother Patricia Passes Away at 83

Sad news from longtime BroadwayWorld friend and fave Jim Caruso that his mother Patricia Howard Caruso, 83, passed away on Wednesday, March 13, 2013 at her home in Edgewater, NJ.

She was born June 22, 1929 to Charles and Helen Howard in Connellsville, PA. Pat graduated from Connellsville High School, then Seton Hill College with a Bachelor of Music Degree. After several years of teaching Elementary Music in Pittsburgh, PA, she married James Vincent Caruso and had a son, James Kent.

She continued her musical interests, performing at the piano, choral directing for Pittsburgh's North Star Players, and later producing fundraisers benefiting the Dallas AIDS Resource Center and The Veteran's Home. More recently, she was an audience favorite at the Manhattan jazz club Birdland, performing alongside her son. Pat is predeceased by her husband James V. Caruso, and her second husband, D. Thomas Byrne.

She is survived by a sister, Jane Bondurant of Indian Wells, CA, and her son, Jim Caruso, of New York City. Memorial donations may be made to the Phyllis Newman Women's Health Initiative, The Actors Fund, 729 Seventh Avenue, 10^th Floor, NYC, 10019.