← Our therapists

Peter Robinson

Counsellor and coach (PGDip, MBACP, MNCPS Accred) he/him

About me

My name’s Peter, I’m a counsellor, and I offer an open-minded, confidential space where you can reflect on what’s happening, find clarity in what’s happened, and figure out what things might look like moving forward.

I work in-person (in Hackney, east London), as well as via Zoom, with clients working in and around the music industry, from singers and musicians to producers, touring personnel, label executives and managers. My counselling and coaching clients have also worked in broader creative industries including acting, TV, photography, advertising, journalism, literature and digital media.

A strong, collaborative relationship is at the heart of good counselling so my goal is to create, with you, a comfortable therapeutic environment where your preferences for therapy are built into our work. I hope the space we create — whether in person or online — is one where you’ll feel supported, heard, and understood.

My background

Before training as a counsellor I spent more than twenty years working with and around musicians and others in the music industry, initially as a music journalist then later behind the scenes in areas like artist development and media coaching.

One element of all this, and the part I grew to find most personally rewarding, involved working with new and established musicians, preparing them to deal with the media — hearing people’s stories and figuring out how they could tell them (or not tell them) on their own terms.

As the full complexity of these artists’ internal worlds came into focus, I wondered if some brief counselling skills training might be a good idea. It ended up being rather less brief than I’d intended! As well as opening up a deep interest in counselling and psychotherapy, I found the training to be a life-changing process. Several years later, I’d qualified as a counsellor.

Working with me

We’ll generally plan to meet (or connect online) at the same time each week, but as a lot of my clients work in the creative industries I appreciate that it’s not always easy to predict what’s going to come up. For that reason I try to offer flexibility where possible.

I draw on therapeutic styles including person-centred, psychodynamic and existential therapies, along with CBT and acceptance and commitment therapy. If you don’t know what any of this means, well, neither did I when I was looking for my first therapist — I’ll be happy to talk it all through with you. I can also bring coaching into our work, so in addition to being able to work on finding clarity in your past and present, I can also help you look at what comes next.

In our first session we’ll explore what’s brought you to therapy and what preferences you have for our work together. It’s an opportunity for me to find out more about what’s happening in your world, but just as importantly it’s a chance for you to find out if you think we’re a good fit. After that first session, if you’d like to continue, we can take it from there.

Peter’s fees