Quiet practice is useful. It can remove superficial drive, make unevenness easier for an adult learner to hear, and stop loudness being mistaken for control at the beginning of learning. But if a passage is learnt only at a very soft level, difficulty at forte is often not a lack of courage. The movement has never been organised under that dynamic condition.
Piano loudness depends mainly on hammer velocity at the string, which is produced through the key’s motion. Research shows that pianists redistribute movement across the fingers, wrist, forearm and upper arm at different dynamic levels. A systematic review also found that louder playing generally involves greater force, joint torque and muscle activity. Most studies use controlled keystroke tasks and cannot prescribe one movement for every player, but they do establish an important boundary: simply adding force to a quiet movement is not a dependable solution.
Take a passage of repeated forte chords. First clarify rhythm and release at a moderate-soft level, then test only two to four chords at the sound required by the piece. Listen for whether the attacks align and the voices remain balanced, while noticing whether the body can release and prepare again before the next strike. If greater volume immediately creates rigidity, shorten the passage or reduce the level rather than trying to endure it. The aim is not to play loudly every day, but to make the full dynamic range a musical condition that has actually been practised.
When practising from a score with <a href="https://apps.apple.com/us/app/scoreflow/id6796205656">ScoreFlow</a>, its score-following view can help keep attention on short dynamic transitions and their sound, with less interruption from finding the place again on the page.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12812707/
https://pubs.aip.org/asa/jasa/article/121/5/2959/538567/Loudness-control-in-pianists-as-exemplified-in
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