Bill Conti

People who haven't seen Rocky still know the Rocky score: that's how famous Bill Conti's tracks are.

The training montage set against "Gonna Fly Now" might be one of the most popular movie tracks of all time. Everyone hums the Rocky theme during their morning workout. (Source: Our own personal morning workout. And by "workout" we mean "donut run." And by "run" we mean "sitting in the drive thru.") The final song, "The Final Bell" was also featured in a 2015 Best Buy commercial… which is how you know you've made it.

Conti's music is invigorating and inspiring, the kind of music Rocky would listen to if he had access to a Spotify playlist on his morning run. But Rocky was made on a shoestring budget, including the music. Conti's tracks brim with the same sort of love that the rest of the movie is filled with—he's not doing it for money, he's doing it to prove that he can.

Rocky's training montages—and there are a ton of 'em—wouldn't be the same without the music moving them along. Conti received an Academy Award nomination for his song "Gonna Fly Now." "Fly" earned him a lot of frequent flier miles, too: Conti scored four other Rocky films.