While there are a great variety of digital musical interfaces available to the working musician, few o er the level of immediate, nuanced and instinctive control that one nds in an acoustic shaker. bEADS is a prototype of a digital musical instrument that utilises the gestural vocabulary associated with shaken idiophones and expands on the techniques and sonic possibilities associated with them. By using a bespoke physically informed synthesis engine, in conjunction with accelerometer and pressure sensor data, an actuated handheld instrument has been built that allows for quickly switching between widely di ering percussive sound textures. The prototype has been evaluated by three experts with di erent levels of involvement in professional music making.