What you need, is a smaller Top Margin in System 1.

The “amateur”s quick-and-dirty solution:

Page Layout Tool. Handles and margins appear on all systems.

Click inside System 1, to select it.

Page Layout menu > Systems > Edit Margins…

The window Edit System Margins appears.

Decrease the Top Margin.

(You can also get to Edit System Margins via the context menu)

… the Document options, Page format, Score option made no changes in my file …

That solution is the “Pro” solution.

Indeed you will not see any changes in already existing pages.

But all new pages will have the new settings.

This is by design, and what users have requested.

To update the already existing pages with the new settings in Page Format for Score, do this:

Page Layout Tool.

Page Layout menu > Redefine Pages > All Pages of Current Part/Score

Amazing, thanks so much Peter! If I might, 1 follow-up question: I'm trying to use ScoreMerger to combine on one page 2 short documents with their titles. I end up with a 2-page merge, even though now with the reduced top system margin, there appears to be lots of room to fit both in. Do you have any tips on what I might be doing wrong?

Thanks again!

In that case the culprit might be a Page Break on Page 2’s top system.

Look for a “Page Break icon” at the beginning of that system.

Probably the culprit is ScoreMerger that has inserted the Page Break.

You can use the Page Layout Tool to remove the Page Break.

Click the top system, to select it.

Then, look in the Page layout menu.

Thanks again! There was no page break showing, but by playing with the ScoreMerger settings, I got them both on the one page. One last small question if you don't mind? As the second file was composed for clarinet, there is a key change showing at the end of the final line of the first document, even though on screen they're both in the same key. Is there a way to delete or hide that key change at end of line?

Measure Tool.

Double-click on the last measure of the first document (which ends with a cautionary key signature).

In the Measure Attributes, select the option

Hide Cautionary Clefs, Key and Time Signatures

Wonderful! Thank you so much Peter for this super helpful advice, I have my clean page now!