call the tune

If someone calls the tune, they are in control of a situation and make all the important decisions.

government will thus reduce this country to one in which the claims of business, commerce and technology will call the tune.

If managers tried to get players to come back in the like they do they'd have a riot on their hands. The players call the tune these days.

change your tune

a change of tune

If someone changes their tune, they express a different opinion about something from the one they had expressed previously, or they show a completely different attitude to something or someone.

Some see signs that the administration has not only changed its tune on the dollar, but is now resigned to higher short-term interest rates too.

He had maintained for many years that the Earl was dead. But these days he has changed his tune.

You can also talk about someone's change of tune.

The refugees, while welcoming the sudden change of tune, greeted this ploy with considerable reserve.

dance to someone's tune

If you dance to someone else's tune, you do whatever they want or tell you to do, usually without challenging them or hesitating. This expression is often used to criticize someone for allowing themselves to be controlled in this way.

During my trip to the region, I reproached trade union leaders for pandering to managers, sometimes going so far as dancing to their tune.

I know cathedral is desperate for money and has to raise cash somehow. But the danger of commercialism is that the churches end up dancing to the tune of their big business sponsors.

You can also say that someone is dancing to a particular tune when they are behaving in a particular way, especially if this is different from the way they were behaving before.

Change is never really easy and cannot be controlled and manipulated. It is a case of having to dance to a tune other than the one you are accustomed to.

With different circumstances in Germany and Britain, we cannot dance to the same tune.