Deutsche Singmesse is a form of (Tridentine) Low Mass approved by certain Catholic bishops in German-speaking countries and by American Catholic bishops for ethnic German parishes in their dioceses. Before the Dialogue Mass that came into use in the 1940s, the responses, propers, and ordinary of Low Mass were said in a low voice by priest and server(s). Thus, unlike the Solemn Mass or the High Mass, the Low Mass was in most cases inaudible by the congregation. In the Austro-Hungarian Empire and in the Catholic states of what is now Germany there arose up the custom of singing hymns throughout Low Mass, by the congregation or choir, in the vernacular. The hymns were essentially texts that paraphrased the particular action of the Mass happening at that time. During the Kyrie eleison (Greek f