command performance

English edit

command performance (plural command performances)

(archaic) A dramatic, musical, or similar entertainment performed before a monarch or other head of state, especially in a circumstance where that ruler has requested or ordered the performance.
- c. 1900, Richard Harding Davis, Billy and the Big Stick:
  "I've been giving a ‘command’ performance for the president," explained the actor modestly.
- 1974 February 4, “People”, in Time:
  Following a 1973 White House command performance and a TV special, Ol' Blue Eyes Is Back, Sinatra made his first nightclub appearance in three years at Las Vegas' Caesars Palace.
- 1998 October 4, Alvin Klein, “Theater: A Potential New Star For an Ever-Rarer Art”, in New York Times, retrieved 11 October 2011:
  And he won't let his audience forget that he was part of a command performance for Queen Elizabeth II in June.
(idiomatic, by extension) A task, activity, or other assignment which one undertakes in order to satisfy someone in authority, such as an employer.
- 2002, Susan Wittig Albert, Indigo Dying, Penguin, published 2004, →ISBN, page 26:
  Some big client of Arthur's is coming to town, and Sally is supposed to entertain the man's wife. She says it's a command performance.