Elise Wagner rarely listen to music while she runs.

Sometimes, she listens to a sports podcast as she runs laps around Memorial Park, or she’ll turn on an energetic booster song to get her through the final few miles of a long run. But more often than not, she plays a loop in her head.

“Being a musician, usually what happens is that whatever I’m playing that week is an ear worm; it gets stuck in my head,” said Wagner, a bassoonist for the Houston Symphony. “I’ll just start running to whatever tempo that is, which can be dangerous because I don’t want to hurt myself or go too slow.”

Lately, it has been the music of Richard Strauss, a German composer, which the Houston Symphony featured in a Thanksgiving weekend performance.

Wagner calls Strauss’s work “extremely demanding” for the orchestra, her lungs and her mind. Being an instrumentalist is the same as training for any sport, she said.

“So much of it is mental, and you can say the same with running,” said Wagner, 38. “But you can decide what amount of pain you want to feel or not - you just have to focus on something else.”

More Information Name: Elise Wagner Age: 38 No. of marathons: 1 No. of Houston Marathons: 0 Shoes: Mizzuno for her high arches Running gear: Compression knee-socks for long runs, Body Glide for chafing and a headband Tech: Garmin Run Watch with GPS and SportsMe app

Read More

Wagner moved to Houston to play bassoon (she’s second chair), a job that she has prepared for since she was a kid taking lessons from her mother, also a bassoonist.

ON RENEWHOUSTON.COM: After years of an eating disorder, former UH runner aims for Olympic trials

She is training for the Houston Marathon, her second 26.2-mile race. But she has been running since elementary school when she competed for the YMCA Cross Country club in her hometown of Monroe, Wis.

“In elementary school, we would have to run the mile, and I’m not sure if my records are still holding, but I set them for the year,” she said, laughing. “I ran competitively in high school through my sophomore year, and then I had to decide which was more important - music or running.”

Hailing from a musical family, she always knew her future would be in music. Her mother was an elementary school music teacher, her aunt plays principal bassoon in the Pittsburgh Symphony and her brother Charles Wagner can play any instrument he puts his hands on. He plays in the Youngblood Brass Band overseas.

“I had to be kind of serious from an early age. I fought that toward the end of high school, like ‘I could do something else; I don’t have to be a musician,’ but I love it,” Wagner said. “Along with it came my passion for teaching, which is fascinatingly making me a better bassoonist and musician all the time. As I teach, the more I learn.”

At the University of Houston, Wagner teaches her music students to train like athletes: they can’t take too much time off, they have to move around when not actively playing and they have to commit to practice and want to get better every day.

Dr. Todd Siff, a surgeon specializing in orthopedic sports medicine at Houston Methodist, focuses on treating musicians, opera singers and ballerinas.

Being a performer is just as strenuous on the body as being a professional athlete, Siff said.

While soccer players have strong legs and pitchers have built-up shoulders and elbows, pianists have exceptional strength and dexterity in their forearms, hands and fingers. As a bassoonist, Wagner’s greatest physical strength is her lung capacity.

ON HOUSTONCHRONICLE.COM: Houston women runners share tips on #RunningWhileFemale

Just like in sports, injury-prevention is part of being a full-time musician. The main difference is the hours of being sedentary that musicians experience, which can lead to a number of health problems.

“One of the major problems that musicians have in terms of injuries is overuse injuries. If a musician is using a certain part of the body continually, it over-stresses that area,” Siff said. “It’s great when you take musicians that are sitting down for extended periods of time and then complement that with activities that work the rest of the body out.”

Wagner benefits most from speed and interval training as a wind player because both are exercises in in lung expansion. In general, running helps with stretching out her arm and leg muscles, as well as her neck and shoulders, which can ache from hunching over an instrument for hours at a time.

“We sit in the same position for so long. As a double-reed player, you have to make reeds, so you’re just sitting, hovering over this piece of cane, trying to make it work and then practicing,” she said. “I think the best thing is that (running) makes me relax and conscious of my body.”

Matt Strauss, associate principal timpanist and section percussionist for the symphony, echos Wagner’s feeling of being “crunched in” even if he stands for practices and performances.

Strauss, 45, calls running an investment in his health. He is training for the Houston half marathon and recently competed in the city’s turkey trot.

Strauss doesn’t listen to anything when he hits the pavement. For him, it’s about noticing the natural rhythm of a city: the sounds of the road, the bayou birds and the people he passes along the way.

“I think it helps anyone that wants to feel level and focused at what they do,” he said. “Exercise, especially cardio, is good for your emotional stability and focus. Those are two things you need to be a successful musician and play your instrument at a high level.”

With the marathon approaching, Wagner is doing most of her interval training on a treadmill and most of her long runs have either been at Memorial Park or through parts of downtown Houston and nearby parks with running trails.

ON HOUSTONCHRONICLE.COM: Muffy King's journey started in the water. Now she creates events in Houston.

She runs four times a week, with a long run on Saturday morning so she has time to rest before symphony concerts that night. Her interval training typically starts with a 2.5-mile warmup, 15-minute fast run and 2.5-mile cool down.

“When training for a marathon, so much of it is mental,” Wagner said. “It’s just like practicing for any concert or an audition: You’re alone, and you have to know that if you put in the work beforehand, the results will be close to what you want.”

Wagner and Strauss are double-booked on Jan. 19. It’s marathon day. And they also have a performance of Tchaikovsky’s “Symphony No. 6,” which will last longer than two hours and contains major bassoon parts.

“It’s going to feel like a second marathon,” she said.

julie.garcia@chron.com

twitter: @reporterjulie

ReNew Houston: Get Houston’s newest source for healthy living, straight to your inbox. Sign up for the newsletter today.