URBANA – John Pennell, the original bassist for Alison Krauss and Union Station, will perform Monday evening at The Iron Post with his wife, Julie, who will play guitar and dulcimer.

At the concert, starting at 7 p.m., John will play guitar. Both Pennells are songwriters and will perform their own Americana and bluegrass songs as well as their "takes on some others," John said.

"We haven't written together," he said. "We've talked about it but never have. Sometimes that's just the way it works out. I told her anytime she wants to but she wants her own thing, and I respect that."

The two have performed recently as a duo, mostly at a songwriters' night at Richard's Cafe in Whites Creek, outside Nashville, where they live.

The Pennells, who have been married for six years, have a daughter who was born last year named Eva, after Eva Cassidy, a singer who died in 1996 from melanoma. In 1994, Cassidy recorded a cover of John Pennell's "If I Give My Heart."

Among other artists who have recorded his songs are Krauss, Alan Jackson, Gina Jeffries, Alecia Nugent, Sam Bush and the Infamous Stringdusters, a newgrass sextet based in Nashville.

John Pennell also is a member of the Nashville-based Charlie Sizemore Band, a bluegrass group that records on the Rounder label. He began performing with Krauss, a Champaign native, when she was 12. He performed in her bands for about six years.

A 1968 alumnus of Unity High School, he studied classical guitar at the University of Illinois before transferring to Southern Illinois University, which had a major in the instrument. After his teacher moved to Arizona State University, Pennell transferred there, ending up with a bachelor's degree in composition and music theory.

He returned to the UI to work on a master's degree in composition and was working on his doctorate in musical arts when he dropped out to play with Krauss, first on guitar and then on bass.