Is there a plugin, either included in SONAR X1 or free to download, that will pitch-bend the audio via automation?

The pitch of the audio would follow the automation envelope. So basically, having a linear automation envelope going from neutral to minimum would create a classic "tape stop" effect.

If someone can direct to the right direction for achieving this, I'd greatly appreciate it!

Not exactly what you describe, but dBlue Tapestop does the tape stop effect (slowing down audio rather than pitch bending it). It's free. The automation envelope for the trigger goes from 0 to >0.5

Maybe this will do ? but I'm not sure

http://products.zplane.de/index.php?page=elastiquepitch

I have the vielklang harmonizer, and come across the above.


Edit : it's not free :)

Bigdogs


Not exactly what you describe, but dBlue Tapestop does the tape stop effect (slowing down audio rather than pitch bending it). It's free. The automation envelope for the trigger goes from 0 to >0.5

I wanted to try dBlue Tapestop, but it is not working on my SONAR X1 Expanded. With JBridge, it just doesn't show up in the vst window... its blank. With BitBridge, it makes the sound jaggedy and crashes my program.


Basically I want the classic "tape stop" effect, but I want to be able to mark with automation exactly WHEN the "tape stop" begins and ends. 

bump please

I think i found the solution for you :) I've been looking for something like this too and found a VST this morning which is called Son of a Pitch and is pretty darn good, even if it is kind of hard to catch on to, but i confirm it works good and has a range of 3 octaves up or down, and is automatable. Although after you install it, if it does like mine, don't look for son of a pitch in the VSTs, look for Container - Synthedit.
 

 
Hope this does the job for you :)

As the unofficial generator of inelegant but effective workarounds, here's a way to do massive pitch shifts that you can manipulate manually. While not necessarily a total “tape stop” effect (the audio can play back really slowly, but doesn’t come to a complete stop - although there is a workaround I'll describe at the end), you can do continuously variable speed effects in real-time without artifacts and with physical control - great for sound design and general sonic insanity.
 
The heart of this technique is using Dimension Pro as a "varispeed" plug-in. First, insert Dimension Pro. Then, drag the clip you want to mangle into the Load Multisample field (just below the four element selection buttons), and do the following steps.
 
1. Set the Bend Dn/Up parameters to 24 for the most extreme effects.
2. Draw a MIDI note at C5 (or a different note if you want the clip to start off transposed) where you want the clip to start playback in Dimension Pro’s piano roll view, and extend the note for the clip’s duration.
3. Your keyboard’s Pitch Bend wheel will now do real-time varispeed control over a four-octave range.
 
It gets even weirder if you use the lo-fi, drive, and other processing options. This technique also works with Rapture, which opens up even more possibilities. (Although you can use the LE versions of Dimension Pro and Rapture, unfortunately their pitch bend range is limited to +/-2 semitones, so you can't get the same drama level for mangling the sound.)
 
As to the tape stop, you can assign the mod wheel to volume in Dimension Pro or Rapture. So, when the sound gets really slow, goose the mod wheel to turn off the volume and mute the sound. But it comes pretty close to slowing down to zero anyway, especially if you set the shift or transpose controls to shift the pitch bend range even lower.
 
Also note that Dim Pro has four elements (and Rapture has six) so you can load up to four files, each with independent pitch bend ranges but which you can have respond to the same pitch bend control (and mod wheel if desired). This can do totally insane things for sound design.

This technique also works with Rapture, which opens up even more possibilities.

... like pitch envelopes.  DimPro has them as well, but limited to +/- two octaves (with Rapture at +/- 8 octaves).
 
Load the clip, set the Pitch EG to On, and the Depth to -9600 cents (to pitch downwards in the extreme).  Set the Sync multiplier to something huge (like 128) for starters, and right-click another node in the upper righthand corner.
 
This kind of approach allows to to fine-tune the "tape-stop" rate and taper by simply dragging around the segment between the 2 EG nodes.  A copied & pasted envelope to the AMP EG can control the volume of the effect.

WOK Tape Break: http://rekkerd.org/wok-releases-tapebrake-effect-plugin/
 
super easy and free. 

honestly i would look into why dblue tapestop isn't working for you
it's a light simple plugin that will do everything you want
 
other than that just search around - there are plenty of time and pitch shifting plugins out there to try