An inherent structural insight, a musical memory and an absorptive power were the main assets Willy Ostyn possessed since childhood. Being an intense player, the studying of a score seems to have determined his horizon as a composer rather than the contact with his colleagues. The lonely contact with the romantic score defined him as an authentic lyric artist and a virtuoso epigone.

Before the war, Ostyn chose an intimate, quasi-impressionistic idiom, which suited performance by his trio. The compositions for this trio for piano, violin and cello are not dated, as most of his work is not, and approximate to the suggestive world of sounds of Debussy, while formally remaining loyal to the themes and motifs he incorporated through Ryelandt and Franck. The qualities of this early chamber music opened up new perspectives for the development of orchestral depth and refinement, but life decided otherwise.

Willy Ostyn’s contact with national radio and the national broadcasting orchestra in 1950 induced a final re-orientation of his art of composing. The composer, who had previously appealed mainly to informed regional listeners because of his adaptation to their taste, could now be enjoyed by any Belgian listener because of his extended symphonic compositions. This prevented him from evolving as a composer and he remarked the following about this:

“I always remained technically and ideologically loyal to the romantic tradition, that considers music as a spontaneous and logical movement from a lyric theme into a classical harmonization and rich, varied orchestration.”

The transparency of his compositions created the effect of easy listening, which explains the enormous popularity of Ostyn. His music was known and performed in several European countries. His skilful piano technique enabled him to undertake transcriptions of Russian and East German romantic works, more specifically pieces by Islamey de Balakirev, the toccatas of Debussy, Schumann, Czerny, Bach, and Chopin. He consulted sometimes Tchaikovsky and Franck for the orchestral creation of his musical evocations, Rachmaninov for piano works.