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Synonyms

song and dance

American  

noun

  1. a story or statement, especially an untrue or misleading one designed to evade the matter at hand.

    Every time he's late, he gives me a song and dance about oversleeping.
song and dance British  

noun

  1. a fuss, esp one that is unnecessary

  2. a long or elaborate story or explanation, esp one that is evasive

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
song and dance Idioms  

  1. An elaborate story or effort to explain and justify something, or to deceive and mislead someone. For example, Do you really believe his song and dance about the alarm not going off, being stopped for speeding, and then the car breaking down? or At every annual meeting the chairman goes through the same song and dance about the company's great future plans. This term originally referred to a vaudeville act featuring song and dance. [Late 1800s]

Etymology

Origin of song and dance

An Americanism dating back to 1870–75

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.