After growing up in Mosjøen, Øyen studied in Oslo under Alf Sjøen and Bjarne Brustad in 1945.
He studied under Ernst Glaser[2] until his public debut concert with Guttorm Skjerven as an accompanist in 1954.
He studied further in Copenhagen under Henry Holst and the royal theater musician Henrik Sachsenskjold.
[1] In the Oslo Philharmonic, he spent the last twenty years of his career as the fourth member in the first violin group.
[1][3] As a soloist, he distinguished himself with performances of Christian Sinding's three violin concertos (Op.