Bach Week’s Richard Webster to Run His 21st Chicago Marathon Sunday October 10

How his stop-smoking strategy became a passion that helps boost the Chicago area’s beloved Baroque music festival

Richard Webster, sporting his Chicago Marathon finisher's medal, poses
with harpists Julie Spring and Marguerite Lynn Williams at Bach Week's
fall 2019 benefit. Webster had completed the marathon just hours earlier.

Acclaimed church musician and composer Richard Webster has been music director of the Chicago area’s Bach Week Festival since 1975, having performed in and helped organize the Evanston-based festival’s 1974 debut.

Another of his passions is running. He’s been completing 26.2-mile marathons since 1995, when, at age 43, he participated in his first Chicago Marathon.

“When I crossed the finish line, it was like walking through the gates of heaven,” he says.

He’ll run his 21^st Chicago Marathon on Sunday, October 10.

As in years past, he’ll be running to raise money for Bach Week. Online donations are welcome here.

His efforts typically raise thousands of dollars to help fund Bach Week’s signature spring concert series.

Sunday’s event will be his 41^st marathon overall. In addition to Chicago Marathons, Webster has run 18 Boston Marathons and one each in Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Webster says he originally  took up running as “a distraction” to help him quit smoking cigarettes.

 “On Ash Wednesday of 1980, I gave up smoking for Lent,” he says.

At first, he could hardly run around a city block “without collapsing in a heap.” As he built up endurance over longer distances, he found that he “really enjoyed running” and decided to train for a marathon.

“I read a book and followed the instructions,” he recalled in a recent interview for this blog. That sounds simple enough, but Webster cautions, “It is grueling, and it never gets any easier. Yesterday I ran 15 miles. I was spent. Legs hurt, feet hurt, everything hurts. But you know there’s a goal.”

His favorite runner’s mantra: “The pain is temporary; the pride is forever.”

Webster sees “mental and spiritual connections” between running and music-making. He likens the intense, focused concentration of marathon training and running to “the full mental commitment required when learning a difficult piece of music.”

A big part of what makes it worthwhile, Webster says, are the throngs of fans lining the marathon route. “Their only job is to cheer you on. I love the energy you get from fans and other runners. It’s not a cutthroat sport at all, it’s very supportive.

“What I love about the Chicago Marathon is that it takes you through so many distinctive neighborhoods, all packed with spectators,” he says. “You’ll be cheered on by a mariachi band in Pilsen and drag queens in Lakeview.”

After crossing the finish line, most marathoners devote the rest of the day — and perhaps the next —to recuperating.  Not Webster. Most years, after running the Chicago Marathon, he dons his marathon finisher’s medal and emcees a fundraising event that evening in Evanston to benefit the Bach Week Festival. “It’s a challenge,” he says, “but I’m not going to miss the opportunity to be with Bach Week’s wonderful supporters.”

This fall’s benefit, a “Bachanalia” featuring expert pairings of wine and live classical music, has been tentatively rescheduled for March 20 due to pandemic-related uncertainties and public health restrictions. Updates will be posted to Bach Week’s website.

Since 2010, Webster has been music director and organist at Boston’s historic Trinity Church on Copley Square. He moved to Boston from Chicago in 2005 to serve as Trinity’s associate music director. Before that, he was music director for three decades at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Evanston, which hosted the first Bach Week Festival.

For more about Webster, his music making , and his marathon runs, check out articles in The Diapason and Chicago Tribune.