Charles Alexander "Sandy" Paton was a folksinger and folksong collector, a recording engineer, and a record label executive. As a performer, Paton was hailed by critic John Greenway as "the best interpreter of traditional singing in the English-speaking world, with the possible but not probable exception of Ewan MacColl." As a song-collector and field-recorder, Paton recorded folk singers in both the US and the UK, including Jeannie Robertson, Jean Redpath, Horton Barker, and Frank Proffitt, whose song "Tom Dooley" later became a million-selling record by the Kingston Trio. Paton believed that modern high fidelity recording technology offered listeners the chance to experience the "richness" and "musicality" of folk music performances in a way that earlier, less-sophisticated recording technologies did not. With his wife Caroline Paton and friends Lee and Mary Haggerty, Paton founded Folk-Legacy Records, a premier folk music recording label. One of his obituaries notes Paton's wide-ranging work on the label's releases, including not only in production and engineering but also in photography.