WordNet
v. exercise authority or be in charge; "Who is calling the shots in this house?" [syn: call the shots, wear the trousers]
Usage examples of "call the tune".
If any friends of Carney's wanted to call the tune I was ready for the dance.
It was as though everything were ready and yet nothing were ready unless she gave orders, as though Hoskins was deliberately standing back and letting her call the tune, to test her.
Mal kicked the dope around, thinking that it played true to his take on the brain trusters: they were duplicitous, they talked a lot, they took their own sweet time acting and let outside events call the tune.
As he explained to Annie one evening after dinner, he had made the same decision for himself shortly after he first read the message, partly because he had come too far to be turned back now, partly because he was just tired of having Neville call the tune to which he would dance.