Longtime band director Frank Piersol dies

If music is the language of the soul, Frank Piersol could converse with the angels.

The longtime teacher, musician and band director died Friday at the age of 98.

Piersol, of Iowa City, dedicated his life to marching band music. He published more than 100 marches, wrote for music publications and toured the country and the world conducting bands and spreading his love of marching band music.

“He treated everyone he played with like he was talking to his best friend, that's the kind of person he was,” said Bob Sadilek. Sadilek, a former music teacher at McKinley Middle School in Cedar Rapids and a 60-year member of the Cedar Rapids Municipal Band, said Piersol is the man who made it one of the finest municipal bands in the Midwest.

“Frank was the finest director and he treated the band like it was his baby, that's what he'd call it,” Sadilek, 74, said. “He had a knack for bringing the best out of everyone.”

Piersol directed the Cedar Rapids Municipal Band for 22 years, stepping down in 1993. Before that, he had worked his way up from teaching music at West Waterloo High School to being band director at Iowa State University. After 20 years at Iowa State, Piersol went to run the bands at the University of Iowa in 1968, semi-retiring in 1980.

But Piersol's passion for music didn't stop there.

“The 98 years tells you just how dynamic he was,” said Morgan Jones, who worked with Piersol at the University of Iowa and replaced him as director of the Cedar Rapids ensemble. “He was full of energy and he went the distance.”

Marcia Welch and her husband, Myron, lived one street down from Piersol in Iowa City for 40 years. Myron went on to take over Piersol's position as director of bands at UI, but Marcia said that didn't keep Piersol out of the band room.

“Sometimes he'd come to the rehearsal and ask them to play a march he'd just arranged,” she said. “He just had this energy, it was just ongoing, it took all of our breath away.”

Marcia Welch said that Piersol had something to offer beyond the scores and scales.

“He had such a wonderful warmth to him,” she said. “He was so funny, and so few people who knew him got to see it.”

Services for Piersol will be at 10:30 a.m. Thursday at Gay & Ciha Funeral and Cremation Service in Iowa City.

In lieu of flowers, memorial donations can be made in his memory to the Cedar Rapids Municipal Band.