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At a measured, middle pace.
Used as a heading (Moderate, Moderately) above the staff or inside phrases such as moderate speed or moderately fast; as a heading it holds until the next tempo direction. It is the English counterpart of Moderato and the German Mäßig.
Also spelled: moderately
A deliberately neutral tempo that lets character words carry the expression. On its own it is vague, so it works best with a metronome figure or a word naming the feel (Moderate, with a lilt). As an adverb, moderately tempers another word (moderately fast); do not add a second softener to the same phrase.
Moderate is one of 1755 terms in the Gradus musical dictionary: the words, abbreviations and instrument names that appear in printed scores, plus the vocabulary composers use to talk about them.
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