No doubt Figi was a more gifted writer than most of us, but there was more to his craft than a gift. Writing was a physical activity with him. At work on an article or a poem, he would stalk the floor, pound the walls, curse, throw things. And what resulted from his struggles were phrases and passages that illuminated the sensuous essence of an artist s work. Jazz was a community as well as a music, and he had always a special affection for the jazz audiences that he grew up with.
Organic art grows out of the community.
Like blues before it, jazz, Figi believed, declined when it ceased to be the living expression of the African-American community. This was simply a fact of life, not something to be mourned, for every art form has its life span, its cycle of formation, maturity, and decline. For most of his adult life Figi worked as an insurance underwriter. A medium-sized, muscular, tattooed individual, he changed considerably in personality after meeting a new, young employee in his office, Rita Hernandez. His gruff intensity mellowed, while his generosity and his old sense of humor, which still could be wonderfully cruel, remained.