Glastonbury 27 - 29 June 2008

Emily Eavis - Festival organiser

The youngest daughter of Glastonbury founder Michael Eavis, Emily has grown up with the festival and is now one of the organisers.

Best: "Musically, one of the best moments was David Bowie in 2000 on the Sunday night, closing the Pyramid Stage 30 years after playing here, coming back pretty much like he had not aged at all. He was even wearing the same jacket - or at least had another one made exactly the same. It was an amazing set. It really felt like he was so pleased to be back and he really connected with it in a great way, which you don't often see."

Worst: "The traveller riots in 1990, seeing outside the kitchen window Molotov cocktails being thrown and vehicles being set alight. It was one of the lowest points of the entire festival history. I was 10. It was pretty scary. It was also night-time and there was loads of activity going on outside. I got taken up to my granny's house, which was at the top of the road, and sat in her house looking out of the window and there was just ambulance after ambulance coming out."

Jo Whiley - Radio 1 presenter

The BBC Radio 1 DJ is one of the faces and voices of the corporation's Glastonbury coverage.

Best: "Seeing Coldplay headline the main stage for the very first time - unveiling new songs like Fix You for the first time as the lights twinkled like fireflies all around. Then afterwards Chris Martin came and read a bedtime story to my daughter India who was about five at the time - that was a sweet moment.

Worst: "The last time we did Glasto, my show launched on air only to be unfairly curtailed by lightning and thunderbolts so that we were taken off air. We had the Kaiser Chiefs all lined up to be on the show live - instead, Ricky and I just wandered off into the boggy distance in our wellies with our brollies because there was nothing else we could do.

"Some of my best Glastonbury memories are of the shows I did with John Peel. Of him carrying me on his back at two in the morning when it felt like Armageddon with the storms of '97. The hardest Glastonbury was the first without him - it was a real struggle - I wasn't alone in missing him very, very much."

Steve Russell-Yarde - Off-site manager

After first working in the car parks in 1988, Russell-Yarde is now off-site manager - meaning he is responsible for everything outside the fence and getting everybody onto the site.

Best: "When England were playing in the European Championships in 2004, there were more people at Glastonbury watching the big screen than there were in the stadium watching the actual match. It was a phenomenal experience."

Worst: "When I first started, everyone used to come in on a Friday after work and the queues used to start in the middle of the afternoon and keep going until about four o'clock on a Saturday morning. You would just stand in a field for 16 hours parking car after car after car after car, and they used to go on and on and on and on and on. But the good thing was after that lot were in, that was it, and you used to get the rest of the weekend off."

Howard Marks - Ex-drug dealer and DJ

The former drug dealer, writer and DJ has been to almost every Glastonbury festival - except when he was in jail in the late 1980s and '90s. He is appearing in the West Dance Tent this year.

Best: "I tend to think of the funniest. In 1996, I'd just come out of prison and was on a number of guest lists. I was only just getting used to this minor celebrity status. I turned up and the guy at the gate looked through the lists, looking carefully at each page and then looking up at me. And then he said: 'No mate, you ain't on any of them, and from I know about you, you can well afford a ticket.' It was a wonderful lesson. Then I saw some hippy friends I knew climbing over the fence so I got my own back in a childish sort of way and climbed over the fence."

Worst: "I suppose everyone's worst moments would be the mud years - '97 and '98. They were absolutely dreadful and no-one enjoyed them. You couldn't even look upwards, you had to look down all the time. Your boots came off in the mud, it was absolutely horrific, there was absolutely no way anyone could have enjoyed it, whatever they were on."

Roy Gurvitz - Lost Vagueness founder

After joining the festival as a site worker in 1986, Gurvitz set up his own field, Lost Vagueness, in 1999. It is now one of the most popular areas of the festival, with weird and wonderful attractions including a casino, ballroom, chapel and roller disco.

Best: "When I was at college, I used to book bands for the student union. I was really proud of the fact that I'd managed to book [ska band] The Beat, and it was their heyday back in their '80s. But I missed it - I missed the most fantastic gig I'd ever organised. At Glastonbury 2004, we booked The Beat, and there were about 30,000 people in the field. They came out on stage and started playing and about half way through his gig, [singer Dave Wakeling] said: 'I've been wanting to play a gig at Lost Vagueness for years and this is one of the best gigs I think we've ever done.'"

Worst: "In 2005, we'd got everything ready by the early hours of Friday morning. We were pretty much there after weeks and weeks of toil and sweat. But everything got washed away on the Friday morning at about six o'clock when the river literally fell out of the sky and landed on the festival. Our wooden dancefloors were all afloat, we had stages that had moved because they'd floated, we had loads of electrical equipment that was now completely unsafe to use because it was soaking wet. Everybody either got up very early or carried on working to put it all straight. By Friday night, we had everything up and running - albeit a few hours late."

Melvin Benn - Operations manager

After being in charge of beer sales at the festival from the early 1980s, Mr Benn grew more involved and is now in charge of much of the event's operations and organisation with his company Mean Fiddler.

Best: "Orbital on the Other Stage playing Chime at midnight just two years ago in what was their final performance was absolutely magical. It really was one of those very, very, very special moments. Musically, there have been so many highlights. As much as it's not fashionable to heap praise on Coldplay, I have to say when they headlined the Pyramid, it was just off the scale, it was so, so good."

Worst: "In 1990, I was dealing with a situation just off site where, at that time, there was a very rampant traveller community that were pretty un-hippy. They were pretty aggressive and the travellers were threatening to kill me. We weren't willing to give in to all of their demands. We weren't willing to allow them all in to sell drugs or give them diesel for their vehicles. That resulted in a stand-off that resulted in a whole number of travellers making quite a vicious attack on the farmhouse, where Michael Eavis lives, just after the festival finished. They didn't care about anybody but themselves and it was very unpleasant."

Ed Wynne - Ozric Tentacles

The Ozric Tentacles frontman first performed at the festival about 15 years ago, playing on makeshift unofficial stages. The band has become closely associated with the event and are appearing again this year.

Best: "One time, we played on the main stage with Donovan as his backing band. It was quite amusing because we learned the set about an hour before we went on. We were just on the edges, camping and playing little gigs around fires, and suddenly we had to charge our way down to the main stage and we didn't really look like the people who would be backstage."

Worst: "My bad memories are more like strange memories. The last time we were there, two years ago, we woke up to find the place absolutely caning it down with rain. The bottom of the tent felt like a waterbed. When I finally got up, I saw a guy floating about on his air mattress actually still asleep. He must have been so out of his head."