One hundred years ago this week, "Clio" of Melbourne's Punch reported, with her usual infectious gusto and sheer joy of living, her thrilling night at the opera.

"Talk about thrills! I can thoroughly recommend anyone who is feeling dull, and would feel the better for an emotional stirring up, to go and hear – and see – the visiting Italian Grand Opera Company in Cavalleria Rusticana and I Pagliacci. A swirl of tempestuous emotion from start to finish.

"Unlike most grand operatic artists, the present company can not only sing, but act intensely. Ardent love, flaming hate, carefree happiness, a very anguish of sorrow, with eloquent hands, gleaming teeth, flashing eyes (and knives to match), all helping in the poignant play of emotion, makes the effect on the audience simply electric.

"When in I Pagliacci one character challenged his rival by biting his ear, which is the artless Sicilian way of challenge, it was so realistic an act that a well known businessman, sitting in the stalls, ejaculated 'By Jove!' and tugged at his collar, which for that tense moment seemed suddenly to have tightened. Frightfully moving! The audience.can scarcely wait until the fall of the curtain in order to applaud, they feel that if they cannot break the emotional tension by thumping the floor or clapping, they will burst."