The Academy’s list of 49 tunes deemed eligible for the Best Original Song Oscar this year seems like a lot for the Music Branch to pick through. That is, until you notice that more than one-fifth of those contenders are from the same film (High School Musical 3, which, thanks to a new rule, is only allowed, at most, two nominations in this category) and you recall that last year’s list included many more songs (59) to choose from. The talent involved this year, however, is tremendous, at least in terms of those performers who sing the tunes on the soundtrack (many of whom had a hand in the songwriting). These artists include Mariah Carey, Etta James, Beyonce Knowles (who played Etta James), Norah Jones, will.i.am, Jack White and Alicia Keys, Danny Elfman, Emmylou Harris, Chaka Khan and Regina Spektor.

Add to those big names such heavyweights as Bruce Springsteen and Peter Gabriel, both of whom are locks to be nominated, as well as tween favorites Miley Cyrus and Zac Efron (along with the rest of the cast from High School Musical 3), and you could have one hell of a concert if the Academy simply turned its awards telecast into one big celebration of the year’s songs written for the screen. Unfortunately for ABC, the Oscars aren’t just about securing viewers, so there’s no promise that the most popular artists will be among the five nominees. Rather, the true Oscar-worthy songs are those tunes that serve their respective films best — in terms of context as much as in the quality of their songwriting.

In addition to Springsteen and Gabriel, another sure thing nominee is Clint Eastwood, who wrote the title song for his film Gran Torino. As for the fourth slot, Cyrus could very well find herself a contender, which would technically allow the marketers of her upcoming Hannah Montana Movie to advertise the film as starring “Academy Award Nominee Miley Cyrus.” Her song, “I Thought I Lost You,” co-written with Jeffrey Steele (and co-performed with John Travolta), from Bolt has already received nominations for both a Golden Globe and a BFCA Critic’s Choice Award (as have Springsteen’s title song from The Wrestler and Gabriel’s “Down to Earth” from WALL-E). The only issue with a telecast performance of this song, despite the fact that it might draw higher ratings than a Best Picture nomination for The Dark Knight, is that a live duet between Cyrus and Travolta could be the creepiest musical number since Rob Lowe and Snow White’s infamous rendition of “Proud Mary” back in 1989.

The final nominee is more difficult to predict. The Golden Globes selected Knowles’ “Once in a Lifetime” from Cadillac Records, which the Academy could use to make up for the singer/actress’ nominal exclusion as one of the songwriters of the 2007 nominee “Listen,” from Dreamgirls. Another favorite is M.I.A. and A. R. Rahman’s  “O…Saya” from Slumdog Millionaire, though this song has stiff competition from Rahman’s “Jai Ho” from the same film. A nod for the latter would be a wonderful recognition of Indian music, yet in a way it would also beg the question of why thousands of other great tunes from Bollywood haven’t been honored in the past (nor will they be recognized in the future). And why this song over other great “world music” possibilities like Bebel Gilberto’s “Forever,” from They Killed Sister Dorothy, and Angelique Kidjo’s “Djoyigbe,” from Pray the Devil Back to Hell? Oh yeah, because it’s the catchier number from the more upbeat (and fictional) Best Picture favorite.

It will be a shame if, like many Oscar categories, there are no real surprises in the nominees for Best Original Song, so to assist the Music Branch in their task, I’ve picked out five alternative selections to those more likely to be nominated:

“Barking at the Moon” by Jenny Lewis, from Bolt – Cyrus might be the bigger ratings draw, but Lewis would bring that indie “hipster” cred not really seen from the Academy since Elliott Smith’s nomination and performance more than ten years ago. Ratings aside, though, “Barking at the Moon” is actually the better of Bolt’s two eligible songs, and it’s just as catchy as “I Thought I Lost You.” Plus, its context is equivalent to the usual Randy Newman tune played over an animated film’s montage sequence. And since Newman is shockingly absent from the category this year, Lewis should fill in for him.

“Sweet Ballad” by ‘Munchausen by Proxy,’ from Yes Man – If the Academy would rather recognize an actress who is also a singer rather than a singer-turned-actress (Knowles) or an actress-turned-singer (Lewis), then it’s time to honor Zooey Deschanel, who has performed on many of her films’ soundtracks, often diegetically and in character. This time she joined up with Von Iva to form Yes Man’s fake band Munchausen by Proxy, which has two songs eligible for the Oscar. The better of the two is this track, which sounds kind of like Julie Cruise fronting Goldfrapp (maybe David Lynch needs to cast Deschanel in something). It might be a little racy to perform a song featuring the repeated backing vocal lyric of “whore, whore, whore,” but it’s no worse than the Oscar-winning lyrics of “It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp.”

“Trouble the Water” by Blackkoldmadina, from Trouble the Water – Recently the Academy has honored two rap songs (“Lose Yourself” from 8 Mile and “It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp” from Hustle & Flow) and one track off a documentary (“I Need to Wake Up” from An Inconvenient Truth), so it’s only fair to go the next step and at least nominate this rap song from a documentary. It would be another of the Academy’s favored stories of triumph, since the track is by the doc’s subject, a relatively upbeat Katrina survivor who turned lemons into lemonade with her home video footage of the hurricane.

“Up To Our Nex” by Robyn Hitchcock, from Rachel Getting Married – If for some reason the Academy wishes to ignore the usual old guys (sure, Gabriel’s never been nominated, but isn’t he almost interchangeable with his former bandmate Phil Collins?), it could do well to nominate Hitchcock, whose song is both lyrically relevant to the film’s story and prominently performed diegetically, which is precisely how an Oscar-winning song should be. Considering how important music is to Rachel Getting Married, it would be terrible for it to be ignored in this category in favor of an end-credits number.

“Dracula’s Lament” by Jason Segel, from Forgetting Sarah Marshall – It’s easy to dismiss both this and Hamlet 2’s “Rock Me Sexy Jesus” as being “funny” songs, comparable to the Oscar-nominated “Blame Canada” from South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut. But “Dracula’s Lament,” though plenty humorous, is no joke; it’s actually a great song that reflects the feelings of Segel’s character in the movie. And it would be the first Muppet-related Oscar-nominated song in more than 20 years.