This year's Emmy competition in the music categories is generating more excitement than usual. That's because the results could yield two new EGOT winners and a first-ever Emmy for veteran film composer Hans Zimmer.

Songwriters Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, already Oscar winners for "La La Land" and Tony and Grammy winners for "Dear Evan Hansen," could finally claim the final piece of the EGOT puzzle if their song "Which of the Pickwick Triplets Did It?" from "Only Murders in the Building" (co-written by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman) wins for best song.

Zimmer, who already has two Oscars (for "The Lion King" and "Dune") and four Grammys (for "The Dark Knight," "Crimson Tide" and two for "Lion King"), could finally take home TV's top honor for one or more of his nominations, for "The Tattooist of Auschwitz" (limited series score and best song, both with Kara Talve) or "Planet Earth III" (documentary score, with Jacob Shea and Sara Barone).

Seventeen nominees, or exactly one-third of the 51 nominees, are newcomers to the competition. Nine of them fall into the music composition categories, including the composers of “Mr. and Mrs. Smith,” “Palm Royale,” “Shogun,” “Silo,” “Slow Horses,” “Lawmen: Bass Reeves,” “Beckham” and “Planet Earth III.”