Don't forget egg shakers. They fit in your pocket and are easy to master. If you're up for more of a challenge, try the bones.
I'll beg to differ...if egg shakers were easy to
master there would be fewer people playing them poorly...
An egg shaker handled well is an asset, but there are
far more people who
think they are playing them well than actually are. Actually, that's probably true of just about any shaker but egg shakers, being super cheap, seem to get abused the most. While I have heard bones played badly it's much less common because usually by the time somebody graduates from plastic eggs to bones they've developed at least
some sense of rhythm.
I remember at one jam somebody's girlfriend (not sexist, just happened to be how it was this particular time) stood right behind me and shook the loudest (*&(^ box shaker I've ever heard about 12 inches from my left ear. Another time there was this guy with
three egg shakers in
each hand. It was kind of comical because people kept moving away from him all afternoon and after a while he'd look around and realize that he was basically standing by himself so he'd go attach himself to another group, whereupon people would start drifting away... LOL
Now, this is probably going to sound snarky and if so I apologize in advance, it's just something that I've observed over years and years. Often, if somebody plays no other instrument than a shaker (or a tambourine, or a bohdran) they are pretty dreadful. Even when they've managed to develop a sense of rhythm they tend not to recognize dynamics and that 80% of the time the percussion should be soft enough that it is more noticeable for its absence than its presence.
The ones who aren't dreadful usually play some other instrument and they use the shaker or what have you to fill in a missing hole in the music rather than playing it because it's the only way they know to participate in the fun and they aren't content just to enjoy the music.
Okay...now...give me a second to pull these flame-proof under-drawers on...
Edit to add: Oh, go to almost any open Irish session - if they haven't put some kind of rules in place to control the mob you will typically see one or two fiddles, maybe a set of u-pipes, possibly a banjo and maybe a flute - and about 300 tinwhistles and 100 bohdrans...
I've seen some open sessions where they set a pretty firm rule that whistlers and bohdrans have to take turns so only one or two are playing any given song, otherwise you can't hear anything but whistles and bohdrans being played badly and loudly...
John