diff --git a/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/CHANGES.txt b/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/CHANGES.txt
index 61d29f43ae..23e82b7946 100644
--- a/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/CHANGES.txt
+++ b/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/CHANGES.txt
@@ -390,6 +390,9 @@ Release 2.4.0 - UNRELEASED
 
     HADOOP-10126. LightWeightGSet log message is confusing. (Vinay via suresh)
 
+    HADOOP-10127. Add ipc.client.connect.retry.interval to control the frequency
+    of connection retries (Karthik Kambatla via Sandy Ryza)
+
   OPTIMIZATIONS
 
     HADOOP-9748. Reduce blocking on UGI.ensureInitialized (daryn)
diff --git a/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/fs/CommonConfigurationKeysPublic.java b/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/fs/CommonConfigurationKeysPublic.java
index 5a75cbdf15..87746bbe39 100644
--- a/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/fs/CommonConfigurationKeysPublic.java
+++ b/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/fs/CommonConfigurationKeysPublic.java
@@ -192,6 +192,11 @@ public class CommonConfigurationKeysPublic {
   /** Default value for IPC_CLIENT_CONNECT_MAX_RETRIES_KEY */
   public static final int     IPC_CLIENT_CONNECT_MAX_RETRIES_DEFAULT = 10;
   /** See <a href="{@docRoot}/../core-default.html">core-default.xml</a> */
+  public static final String  IPC_CLIENT_CONNECT_RETRY_INTERVAL_KEY =
+      "ipc.client.connect.retry.interval";
+  /** Default value for IPC_CLIENT_CONNECT_RETRY_INTERVAL_KEY */
+  public static final int     IPC_CLIENT_CONNECT_RETRY_INTERVAL_DEFAULT = 1000;
+  /** See <a href="{@docRoot}/../core-default.html">core-default.xml</a> */
   public static final String  IPC_CLIENT_CONNECT_MAX_RETRIES_ON_SOCKET_TIMEOUTS_KEY =
     "ipc.client.connect.max.retries.on.timeouts";
   /** Default value for IPC_CLIENT_CONNECT_MAX_RETRIES_ON_SOCKET_TIMEOUTS_KEY */
diff --git a/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/ipc/Client.java b/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/ipc/Client.java
index b444a115cb..764c7dca5c 100644
--- a/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/ipc/Client.java
+++ b/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/ipc/Client.java
@@ -1562,8 +1562,13 @@ static ConnectionId getConnectionId(InetSocketAddress addr,
         final int max = conf.getInt(
             CommonConfigurationKeysPublic.IPC_CLIENT_CONNECT_MAX_RETRIES_KEY,
             CommonConfigurationKeysPublic.IPC_CLIENT_CONNECT_MAX_RETRIES_DEFAULT);
+        final int retryInterval = conf.getInt(
+            CommonConfigurationKeysPublic.IPC_CLIENT_CONNECT_RETRY_INTERVAL_KEY,
+            CommonConfigurationKeysPublic
+                .IPC_CLIENT_CONNECT_RETRY_INTERVAL_DEFAULT);
+
         connectionRetryPolicy = RetryPolicies.retryUpToMaximumCountWithFixedSleep(
-            max, 1, TimeUnit.SECONDS);
+            max, retryInterval, TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS);
       }
 
       boolean doPing =
diff --git a/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/resources/core-default.xml b/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/resources/core-default.xml
index 746d209715..c7671c5451 100644
--- a/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/resources/core-default.xml
+++ b/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/resources/core-default.xml
@@ -618,6 +618,14 @@
   </description>
 </property>
 
+<property>
+  <name>ipc.client.connect.retry.interval</name>
+  <value>1000</value>
+  <description>Indicates the number of milliseconds a client will wait for
+    before retrying to establish a server connection.
+  </description>
+</property>
+
 <property>
   <name>ipc.client.connect.timeout</name>
   <value>20000</value>