Osborn died tragically of cancer, after which Renna worked either alone or by returning to Röntgen when concerts were on the horizon. "I started broadcasting quite early, and to prepare I would always go back to Johannes in Amsterdam. I was fortunate later on to have a couple of agents, one of whom looked after solo and the other chamber engagements."

Chamber music is something of a passion for Renna and she teamed up with a fellow South African, the violinist Bridget Ranger, to form a successful and critically- acclaimed duo. "We rehearsed every week, whether we had engagements or not, and we had several important works written for us, including one commissioned by the Arts Council from Alun Hoddinott. Life began to get very busy." Other musicians were invited to join them for concerts, including one with whom she was to work again closely in later years at the Royal Northern College of Music, the horn player and conductor, Timothy Reynish. "By then, I was doing a lot of broadcasting, in particular in the field of contemporary music, in which the then controller of Radio 3, William Glock took a great interest. He invited me down to the Dartington Summer School to teach classes, which began to lead my life in new directions as a teacher." At about the same time she was asked to advise students at Birmingham University, which had decided to include a performance element in their degree courses. some of these students later became the Royal Northern's first postgraduate intake; in the meantime, other teaching work began to develop, but was always kept in check whilst she continued her career as a performer. A chance accident in which she damaged her elbow badly, the result of falling on a patch of ice when out one winter with her children, almost made the decision for her to develop this side of her work into one that was soon to become as great a passion as performing. She accepted a part-time post at Chetham's School of Music in Manchester and, in 1980, agreed to teach a handful of students at the RNCM, where she was to be afforded what she feels has been one of the great privileges of her career, the chance to teach some of the finest pianists of the last twenty years, a list that includes both Steven Osborne (see Online Journal, February 2001) and Paul Janes, who provided March's Into Practice article on the performance of Mozart's Sonata in A major, K331.