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But one unknown composer who is almost certain to be nominated this year is Ludovic Bource. A great score was crucial to the success of a film like The Artist, as silent films are reliant on their scores to create tone and atmosphere as well as keep the pace of the film up. Bource delivers on that front, and considering how much love there is for the film, clearly there is also a lot of love for the music. Bource is virtually guaranteed a nomination and is the frontrunner to win the award.

Beyond Bource, the only contenders for this award are the usual suspects. John Williams seems to be assured of a nomination every time he hums during a movie. Between 1990 and 2006, Williams was nominated 18 times, and in his career has been nominated for multiple films in the same year nine times (some of those were years when Best Score was split into multiple categories). Since then his output has slowed considerably, and the only film he scored between 2006 and 2011 was Indiana Jones and the Abomination That Shall Never Again Be Mentioned.

But this year Williams scored two films, which means his chances of being nominated twice are pretty good. His best bet is for the historical drama War Horse, but he is also in the running for The Adventures of Tintin. Will the latter score be too light and actiony for The Composers? It's hard to say, as Williams was nominated for Catch Me if you Can but not Minority Report or War of the Worlds.

The other renowned composer with multiple horses in the race (although none as warlike as Williams') is Alexandre Desplat, who has had the most prolific output of anybody in the film industry over the last several years. This year Desplat wrote scores for seven films, plus the opening and closing music for Roman Polanski's Carnage. His best shot is for either the last Harry Potter film or the 9/11 drama Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.

Two previous Harry Potter films have been nominated in this category (the first and third, both of which had John Williams as their composer) so it would not be a shock if the last film shows up here as a way of awarding the series as a whole. And while Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close has gotten very mixed reviews, the score has garnered quite a bit of attention. It would not be surprising if its only nomination was for its score, as respect for Desplat - who has been nominated four times in the last five years - could easily trump distaste for the film. Of course, if the composers want to be wacky (and when don't they want to be wacky?) they might nominate him for his work on The Ides of March.

The other serious contenders for nominations, all of whom have been nominated before, have only one film in contention, those slackers. Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross are back again this year after winning here last year for The Social Network. Clearly, the composers weren't put off by the idea of nominating the frontman of metal band Nine Inch Nails, and there is no reason to expect they won't be similarly impressed by the duos score for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Of course, The Social Network was a guaranteed Best Picture nominee, which Dragon Tattoo is not.

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