Born in Vicenza, Ferrio studied at conservatories of Vicenza and Venice. He started working at the end of the fifties, and was pretty active as a composer of film scores, signing about 120 sound-tracks especially for spaghetti westerns and commedie sexy all'italiana films. His piece "One Silver Dollar", the main theme to Giorgio Ferroni's Blood for a Silver Dollar (1965), was later included in Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds. Ferrio was married to ballerina and film actress Alba Arnova.