A closet full of skeletons and music by Ella Fitzgerald will mesh on Sunday evening for the third-annual Iowa State Dance Scholarship Benefit Concert.

The concert serves as a way for the department to make money for scholarships and provide funding for quality dance training.

Among the dances that will be presented at the concert is the “Dracula” piece, “A Comedy Noir Ballet.” This number features Iowa State student Jeremy Waymire dancing with a child dressed in a devil costume, as well as ISU student Michael Chan, who will lead a closet full of skeletons into the dance.

“The program should be a fun and pleasing experience,” said Janice Baker, assistant professor of dance.

The dances for the performance were choreographed and will be performed by ISU dance faculty members, students and area professionals. Laurie Sanda, assistant professor of dance, said bringing in the professionals gives students a link to the community.

“These professionals show the students that this is what you can look forward to as dancers in the world,” Sanda said.

All forms of dance, from ballet to modern, will be performed at the benefit. Sanda’s piece, which is titled “Suite Ella,” consists of five songs by Ella Fitzgerald, and incorporates many different forms of dance.

Sanda said all five pieces in the 15-minute dance have a different flavor and are meant to be light-hearted and fun.

While Sanda was choreographing the piece, she tried to get the sense of vitality and energy that comes from the timeless quality of Fitzgerald’s writing and voice.

“These songs make me feel like dancing,” Sanda said. “When I hear her music, choreography just flows right out of me.”

Sanda’s pieces will be performed by some of her students as well as members of Orchesis I. Sanda choreographed “Suite Ella” last year for another group of students, but brought it back out to be used for this year’s concert. She remembered that it took 20 hours to teach the students the piece.

Vernon Windsor, musician and composer-in-residence for the dance department, choreographed a modern piece titled “Dryad,” which will be performed by Kathleen Hurley of The Chamber Dancers. Windsor described his piece, which is about a tree spirit, as “simple and short.”

“It is not what the dancer does, but how she does it,” Windsor said.

Windsor said modern dance is a dance form that could feature something as bizarre as “text spoken backwards while hanging upside down.”

“Modern dance focuses on the use of the torso, but other than that it is pretty broad,” Windsor said.